Sploid: Where awesome, wild, and breathtaking tech moments burst into view.
The more propellers and motors you add to a drone, the more weight it can lift. Freefly Systems’ Alta 8, designed to carry heavy video equipment, has eight rotors making it strong enough to tow a surfer on a wakeboard. Say hello to the new sport of dronesurfing where waves aren’t necessary. Is this even…
The Dunking Devils, last seen pulling off incredible trick shots while swinging from a bridge, are back with an even wilder collection of dunks and stunts that all take place on board a moving train. It’s especially impressive when you consider how hard it is just to stand still on the subway, let alone launch…
Throw some dye into milk, add a drop of soap and suddenly the whole thing turns into a psychedelic mess of shapes and colors. Sound familiar? You probably did this science experiment in the 5th grade and felt astounded by it. Now you’re an adult, and the only way to recapture that magic is to…
Every year Paul Borrud builds a massive homebrew Slip N Slide to help celebrate Australia Day, which falls on January 26. (Remember, it’s summer there.) This year’s effort measured almost 330-feet long and ended in a billabong that wasn’t quite large enough to contain most riders as they came rocketing down the slope. But risking…
Some movie scenes are unforgettable, and Steven Spielberg’s reenactment of the Normandy Landing is one of them. Every shot feels chaotic, with indiscriminate bloodshed consistent with this brutal event. But as Nerdwriter1 explains in the video below, Spielberg’s filmmaking choices are anything but random. For starters, he’s a student of history. In order to capture…
A diver, jumper, and all-around daredevil who goes by 8Booth decided to do a bit of creative trespassing near California’s Crystal Cove. He leapt from an outcropping known as “el morro” but apparently misjudged how far the rocks jutted out below. (Because no one would intentionally cut it this close, one hopes.) “I walked away…
Despite the name “canned air,” computer duster isn’t oxygen at all. It’s actually 1,1-Difluoroethane kept under pressure in its liquid form and released as a freezing cold gas. It can cause moderate frostbite. It can get you high if you huff it (but don’t do that—it’s a truly awful idea.) And it makes boiling water…
The robotic versions of competitive sports are usually disappointing at best—but not when it comes to Sumo Wrestling. The human titans who try to slowly push each other out of a circular ring are actually far less exciting than these tiny zippy robots whose matches are usually over almost as quickly as they begin. Unlike…
This Old Tony is good on a lathe. Really good. If it feels self-explanatory as a tool (thing spins fast, other thing stays still) just listening to him talk about it makes it clear that most of us don’t know jack shit about machining. In his most recent project he made one of those fancy…
Last week, the haves, have-nots, and welders of the world reunited in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert for Burning Man 2016. The week-long festival celebrates ingenuity, hacking, making, and a valid reason to go a week without bathing. Mark Day was there to capture all of the insanity, and created a hyperlapse of all the Burning…
Every once in a while a video comes along that changes the way you think about yourself, about the world, and about everything you thought you believed. Such was the case with this video of the band Dancing Noodle making electronic dance music using just rubber chickens, a table, and a paper cup. Were this…
Finding 116 excavators to demolish an aging 24-year-old overpass in just one night is all but impossible—unless you live in China. In the city of Nanchang, contractors assembled an army of construction equipment to tear down the main part of this overpass in just one night, with the entire job requiring only a 56-hour disruption…
The talented pilots at Drones.nc had a whale-watching experience they’ll never forget. Not only did three massive humpback whales circle the boat they were on, they were also able to capture the experience from a DJI Inspire drone flying overhead recording glorious 4K footage. If you’ve ever thought about one day going on a whale-watching…
Before I happened upon this video, I would’ve assumed that a crab would devour its meal haphazardly, primitively. Apologies for misjudging. Turns out crustaceans, much like stars, are just like us! Or at least they enjoy their food with the endearing precociousness of a human toddler. Luckily, the crab owners of the world have blessed…
Where do boats go when they’re no longer fit for the high seas? As it happens, they go to Staten Island. For instance: the Arthur Kill ship graveyard, located just across from New Jersey’s Tuft’s Point. The ship graveyard has a storied history reaching back to World War 2, when the nearby scrapyard bought obsolete…
Did you know there was an official vaping sport called Cloud Chasing? Competitors compete to make the most impressive smoke plumes, but few would be able to challenge the world’s largest air cannon that can blast massive smoke rings capable of toppling mighty box forts. Built for a Czech TV show called Wonders of Nature,…
Scaling a sheer cliff face like climber Liu Yongbang does in China takes incredible strength, unparalleled determination, and the ability to completely block out thoughts of falling hundreds of feet to your demise. He may have the courage to tackle something like this, but odds are you’re going to want to keep a clean pair…
As a continuation to last year’s classic video edit Hell’s Club, where Antonio Maria Da Silva of AMDS Films stitched together famous movie characters into one tremendous club scene, comes this epic bathroom scene. Characters like Tony Montana from Scarface and Tyler Durden from Fight Club can get into a brawl, while Jack Torrance from…
Filmmakers have been stop-motion animation for eons, but holy crap man, people have gotten really, really good at it. This video by Vugar Efendi tracks the evolution of stop motion in film starting with The Enchanted Drawing in 1900, which was really just a drawing of a face changing facial expressions, all the way up…
Digital photography is reliable, consistent, and increasingly easy to use. But when it fucks up, boy does it fuck up. Panoramic shots on the iPhone in particular seem prone to some bizarre aberrations that squash or stretch objects. So a photographer who goes by Hanamomo on Twitter figured out a creative way to turn this…
