10 YouTube Channels For Original Animations

YouTube has become the new home for original content creators, with many forging exciting new careers for themselves by making videos which are watched by millions of people. In the same way that reality television has managed to find stars lurking among the masses, YouTube (as well as its various alternatives) has offered an opportunity for talented people to find an online audience.

One genre that demonstrates this trend extremely well is animation. Animators who would previously have struggled to ever have their creations seen by anyone now have a platform on which to show off their wares. The range of styles on offer is immense, with satirical stick drawings sitting alongside computer-generated cultural critiques.

What follows are 10 of the best YouTube channels for original animation. All of which are worth watching and subscribing to for regular bursts of free funnies.

Simon’s Cat

Simon’s Cat is an episodic comic featuring the titular Simon’s Cat. Simon’s Cat is literally Simon’s cat, the animator being Simon Tofield and the animated adventures being based on the exploits of his own cat(s). This channel will appeal to anyone who has cats, loves cats, or has that strange obsession with cats half the Web currently seems to have.

Oney’s Video Hole

Oney’s Video Hole features videos made by Chris O’Neill. Not all of the videos are animations, but even the live-action clips are worth watching. The animated clips are a little on the strange side, with popular culture references such as Harry Potter and Dragon Ball Z mocked. This channel will appeal to anyone with a sense of humor.

RageNineteen

RageNineteen is the pseudonym of Jamie Spicer-Lewis, who creates videos of both the animated and live-action variety. As with many of these channels the animation is rather offbeat, with short clips often telling a single protracted joke. This channel will appeal to anyone who sees how Mario being ground into a million pieces is comedy gold.

Lee Hardcastle

Lee Hardcastle is a video producer who creates “claymations that are not for children.” That is a very accurate description of the content, with music videos and film spoofs made with clay figures. This channel will appeal to those who like claymation as a style of animation couple with clever pop culture jokes.

Custard Productions

Custard Productions is a YouTube channel dedicated to mostly animations created using Lego. There is some live-action content too, but the Lego videos are what you’ll stick around for. They’re immaculately made and the humor is very well observed. This channel will appeal to lovers of Lego who also like a laugh. Which is everybody, isn’t it?

Weebl’s Stuff

Weebl’s Stuff is the YouTube channel of Weebl AKA Jonti Picking. It’s the video accompaniment to the Weebl’s Stuff website, with all the animations posted to both. There are character-driven cartoons and one-off skits, the latter including the video embedded above. This channel will appeal to anyone with a penchant for the slightly bizarre.

HISHE

HISHE is an acronym for How It Should Have Ended. This channel is therefore dedicated to one thing and one thing alone: re-imagining the endings to movies, with usually hilarious results. HISHE manages to show Hollywood up for its ridiculousness time and time again. This channel will appeal to movie buffs with a compunction to scream in the cinema.

Cyriak

Cyriak is the YouTube channel of Cyriak Harris, a freelance animator from the U.K. who has made a name for himself with a particular style not easily mimicked. If you watch the video above you’ll know immediately whether this style is to your tastes or not. This channel will appeal to those who like their animation to resemble an LSD trip.

TomSka

TomSka is one of the more famous YouTube celebrities on this list, with a channel dedicated to all sorts of content, only some of which are animations. Thomas Ridgewell is the brains behind the operation, but he also has help from others. This channel will appeal to those with a quirky sense of humor who haven’t got very long attention spans.

Mondo Media

Mondo Media is responsible for some of the finest for-adults-only animations on the Web. Happy Tree Friends is its most famous creation, and if you have yet to sample that series you have hours of mindless cutesy violence ahead of you. This channel will appeal to just about anyone and everyone, assuming they haven’t undergone a sense of humor bypass.

Conclusions

The 10 channels listed above represent the best verticals on YouTube for animated shorts, but there are lots more lurking somewhere waiting to be discovered. Some animators don’t produce regular content but are responsible for some truly strange, dark, and creepy one-off animations.

As always we’d love you to chime in with your thoughts on the subject matter. What do you think of this list? Are there any YouTube channels packed full of animations that didn’t make the cut but that you wish had been included? Which of those which did make it is your favorite? Please let us know in the comments section below.

Image Credit: Jurgen Appelo

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MediaPortal, Free Media Center For Windows 8

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No matter which edition of Windows 8 operating system you are using, Windows Media Center isn’t part of Windows 8. Media Center is available as a paid add-on for Windows 8 Pro edition only (see Windows 8 vs Windows 8 Pro) and one needs to shell out $9.99 to purchase Media Center Pack. Windows 8 [...]

Larger URLs for Google Search Results

Google emphasizes web addresses displayed below the links to the search results. URLs are a lot larger and are harder to ignore. The "share" link for Google+ is also more visible, although it's still displayed when you mouse over a search result.

Here's a side-by-side comparison with the old interface:

Google Reader Data Points

It's hard to estimate the number of Google Reader users, but here are some data points:



- the most popular feed has more than 24 million subscribers (CNN):

- the second most popular feed has 6.6 million subscribers (Engadget):

- the third most popular feed has 1.7 million subscribers (NY Times)



- Google's official blog had 100,000 subscribers in 2007 and now it has about 353,000 subscribers

- JoelOnSoftware.com had 42,000 subscribers in 2008 and now it has 148,000 subscribers.



- according to FeedBurner, 87% of the subscribers to this blog's feed use Google Reader or iGoogle. Google Reader says that this blog has 115,035 subscribers, while the total number of subscribers is 144,173. Here are the FeedBurner stats (the green lines show the number of subscribers):

Here's the Google Trends chart for [google reader]:

Download Official Twitter App For Windows 8

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Good news for all Twitter lovers running Windows 8 operating system. Five months after promising to build an official client for Microsoft’s newest iteration of Windows, Twitter has finally released the first version of official Twitter app for Windows 8/RT and is now available in Windows Store. The official Twitter app for Windows 8 sports [...]

No More Google Reader

Google announced that Google Reader will be discontinued on July 1st. It's a sad news, but it was inevitable. Google Reader has always been "on the chopping block" because it never got enough traction.



Everything started with a feed parser built by Chris Wetherell that turned into a feed reader, helped by Ben Darnell, Laurence Gonsalves, and Mihai Parparita. The product was launched in 2005 as a Google Labs project and it was significantly improved one year later, when the Google Reader team launched a completely new version. Over the years, Google Reader integrated with iGoogle, added social features and handled feed serving for all Google products. Back in 2007, Google Reader crawled 8 million feeds and 70% of the traffic was from Firefox users.



In 2011, Google removed Reader's social features and replaced them with a Google +1 button. It was the beginning of the end for Reader, who lost all the engineers from the original team. Google Reader is in maintenance mode ever since then.



While feeds are no longer important for many users and browsers start to drop support for reading feeds, social networks make newsfeeds popular and mobile apps like Flipboard simplify reading the news. Feeds are now a behind-the-scenes technology and full-fledged feed readers seem outdated.



"We know Reader has a devoted following who will be very sad to see it go. We're sad too. There are two simple reasons for this: usage of Google Reader has declined, and as a company we're pouring all of our energy into fewer products. We think that kind of focus will make for a better user experience," says Google's Alan Green.



It's hard to find a replacement for Google Reader, since Google Reader was the most popular feed reader and the competition couldn't keep up with it. You can still find some web-based feed readers, but none of them is as good as Google Reader. Congratulations to everyone who worked on the Reader team and thanks to all the people who subscribed to this blog in Google Reader.



Here's Google Reader's team from 2007:

9 Ways in Which Facebook Holds You By The Balls [Weekly Facebook Tips]

Have you ever entertained the thought of quitting Facebook? And how quickly did you dismiss this idea?

Most of us don’t realize it right away, but we’re pretty seriously invested in Facebook. Once we have been hooked in, it is almost impossible to let go. Even if you are not that active, you are probably using a bunch of passive Facebook services. Are you even aware of how deep you have slipped into the comfy confines of social networking? Before you think about leaving, find out what it is that you got yourself into!

It Caters to Your Curiosity

Remember why you joined Facebook? You probably wanted to keep in touch with all those special people. Maybe you wanted to find out more about someone, but had to join Facebook and friend them to see their profile. Whatever the reason, I’m pretty sure you were curious and wanted to see what it is all about and what everyone was talking about. Yes, peer pressure probably played into it as well.

And guess what? That’s exactly what is keeping you actively engaged with Facebook until this day! You love to see what your friends are up to and…

It Helps You Stay in Touch

There is nothing like Facebook to send a quick message and say ‘hi’ to someone. Email can be so daunting, but a Facebook message can be short and simple, it’s more like a chat anyways. And if your friend happens to be online, you can simply IM them.

You want to stay in touch with people or at least have the feeling that you still have a connection with someone. It’s probably Facebook’s most compelling feature as it makes people both join and stay. After all, almost everyone you care about is there and it’s so easy to add more people to your collection of friends.

Your Ego

What would other people think if you suddenly didn’t use Facebook anymore? Well, frankly, the worst that could happen is that they wouldn’t even notice. In any case, they would probably get over it and forget about you pretty fast. To be insignificant and forgotten is what scares you most.

No, you literally Like to be Liked! You enjoy being part of the group and want people to take notice of you. Nothing boosts the ego like receiving a Like.

It Stores Personal Memories

For many people, Facebook is much like a personal archive. It stores personal memories like photos, status updates, and messages from others. Imagine you lost all that.

Fortunately, you can download a copy of most of what you have shared on Facebook. The archive includes photos and videos you have shared, wall posts, messages, chat conversations, friends names, and most email addresses. Unfortunately, it’s not possible to restore this information to a new account.

It’s Part of Your Work

Are you maintaining a Facebook page as part of your job or freelance career? Facebook owns you right there and you know it.

It Knows the Birthdays of Your Friends

Facebook not only knows the birthdays of most of your friends, it also reminds you of them on site, via email, or through your connected calendar. And if you don’t see your friend personally or forgot to send a card, it’s acceptable to congratulate them via Facebook. No more hard feelings; at least you did think of them on their Birthday. Or was it Facebook?

If you do decide to quit Facebook, remember to export your friends’ Birthdays first!

You Will Miss Out on Events

It has become common practice to organize, announce, and invite to events via Facebook. If you’re not on Facebook, you will most likely miss out. That’s unless you hear about the event via other avenues. Ask yourself how likely that is to happen.

When you leave Facebook, all existing events that you have been invited to will disappear from your connected calendar. For a smooth transition, be sure to export your Facebook events.

You Will Lose Your Social Logins

Social logins are extremely convenient. On how many websites did you use Facebook to sign up, rather than creating a separate account? And do you really want to visit several dozen websites and update your account with new login information?

Well, if the answer is yes, go to your account’s App Settings to get an overview of where you have been using Facebook to sign in.

You Will Lose Your Phone Contacts

Facebook is convenient, but also sneaky. Did you permit it to sync your friends’ contact data to your phone contacts? I bet half your address book is provided by Facebook. It couldn’t be easier; after all your friends are curating their own contact data for you. However, if you ever lose access to Facebook, you’ll notice how much you rely on that information.

Facebook doesn’t allow you to directly export your friends’ contact data. However, you can import it into other accounts, including Yahoo! Mail, but not Google.

Conclusion

It takes a lot of determination to quit Facebook. If you have relied on a lot of Facebook’s services, you need to export data, set up new routines, and find other ways to socialize online. Staying in touch with everyone will be the hardest part. You might even have to drop a few friends. However, if this frees up more time for real friendships, then that’s actually a good thing. In any case, you better have a Plan B because sometimes Facebook quits on you.

What makes Facebook so attractive to you?

Image credits: Curious Kid via Shutterstock, Keep in Touch via Shutterstock, A Look from Darkness via Shutterstock

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5 Fun Things To Do Online With HTML5

HTML5 continues to go from strength to strength, with more websites switching to the new standard that brings multimedia content to the Web without the need for plugins such as Adobe Flash. Is that blasted thing dead yet? Sadly not, but the need for it is slowly being removed. And not before time.

While HTML5 is far from ubiquitous at this point, an increasing number of websites are using it, and in increasingly inventive and impressive ways. What follows are five fun things to do with HTML5, and all you need is a compatible browser; the latest versions of Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Opera, and Internet Explorer, for example.

Hear… The Rational Keyboard

The Rational Keyboard is an HTML5 Web app from Fritz Obermeyer. It comprises a melody maker that constantly plays a harmony, with the user able to change the note the harmony is based on.

The notes constantly shift around and change size in order to keep the song playing in an aurally pleasing manner. Until the sound glitches, at which point you’re advised to pause the keyboard to reset it.

There are four different instruments featured, though changing them only changes the look, not the sound. Having said that, ‘Wedges’ worked the best for me, offering a simple interface that resulted in glitch-free playback.

The source code for The Rational Keyboard is available on GitHub, while the audio encoder can be grabbed for use in other apps.

Teach… The Two Minute Test

The Two Minute Test does exactly what you’d expect it to: ask you several questions in order to test your general knowledge and intelligence level. The ultimate aim is to see whether you have the basic skills required to become a teacher.

The questions are all presented in a pleasing visual format, with floating numbers, representations of the planets in the Solar System, and answers that can be dragged into place.

You begin with 100 points out of 100 points, with your score dropping as you make errors. And unless you’re Stephen Hawking or another one of these popular scientists, you will make errors.

There are only six tasks to complete, but then it’s only meant to be a two minute test. If it takes you longer than two minutes then, well, I wouldn’t advise applying to join Mensa anytime soon.

Manipulate… Catifier

Catifier has a very simple premise at its core, and in an age when cats appear to be some kind of tradable commodity on the InterWebs, it’s a fun tool to try out. At least for five minutes.

You’re presented with a sample image which you can choose to swap out for an image of your own choosing. All you need is a URL, hence I was able to augment the famous photograph in the screenshot above with a feline fragrance.

To be honest Catifier isn’t perfect. It takes some time for a click on one of the cats to register, but a little patience sees them eventually moved across to the main window ready for maneuvering into position.

I don’t quite know why this particular Web app hasn’t been better utilized by the bods at Reddit. Surely this is the perfect tool for creating upvote-worthy images featuring cats, cats, and more cats.

Look… Brandon Generator

Brandon Generator, or The Random Adventures Of Brandon Generator to give it its full title, is an intriguing concept that’s part Web comic, part animated short, and part HTML5 experiment.

The content was written by Edgar Wright (director of Hot Fuzz and Shaun Of The Dead), illustrated by Tommy Lee Edwards of LucasFilm, and narrated by Julian Barratt from The Mighty Boosh.

There are four episodes of Brandon Generator in all, with the storyline of the later episodes decided by the public who interacted with the content when it was first uploaded to the Web in 2012.

Microsoft was behind Brandon Generator, hence the appearance of the Internet Explorer logo around the site. However, thanks to HTML5, the content is available to view in all modern browsers.

5+… Shiny Demos

Shiny Demos may be just one site, but it offers a veritable smorgasbord of HTML5 goodness. There are dozens of demonstrations of the power of HTML5 on offer, none of which will take more than a few minutes to try out.

The apps utilize different elements of HTML5, all divided into sections so that you can easily see which are responsible for bringing each app to life right in your browser.

As well as the games and interactive displays of audio and video, there are explanations of the various elements that make up HTML5. This could offer budding Web developers a way in to understanding the basics.

Shiny Demos should keep you occupied for a while, and if you’re anything like me you’ll keep the site bookmarked for further tries of Inbox Attack and Paranoid. Shiny Demos was made by Opera Software, but it will work across the full range of browsers.

Conclusions

These 5 websites represent just a small smattering of the cool destinations using the latest Web technology to improve our lives/provide a means of easing the boredom (delete as appropriate). We’ve previously seen impressive HTML5 Web Comics, impressive (and free) HTML5 games, and a selection of websites that quickly did amazing things with HTML5.

The especially observant among you may have noticed an acrostic lurking in this article. First, award yourself a peanut for your skills, then go and read my guide on creating a poem for a loved one. After that come back here and post your comments on HTML5, the websites mentioned above, and anything else that you might have on your mind that loosely fits the subject matter.

Image Credit: Yuki Honda

The post 5 Fun Things To Do Online With HTML5 appeared first on MakeUseOf.

Not Just Videos, Upload your Photos to YouTube

You need not to convert your picture slideshows into a video for uploading to YouTube. Just drag the pictures into YouTube and it will transform them into a nice video with Pan and Zoom effects.

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This story, Not Just Videos, Upload your Photos to YouTube, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 13/03/2013 under YouTube, Internet.

Related Reading:

1. How to Make Videos for Flickr From Your Photos


2. How to Upload Photos from a Mobile Phone to Facebook


3. How to Embed YouTube Videos in PowerPoint


4. Build a PDF Slideshow with your Facebook Photos


5. Download your YouTube Videos in their Original Resolution