My name is Daniel Would my channel is Maker Geek and yeah I guess I I make a
range of things
As a Maker and a Geek I kind of put it right in the name as it were
yeah maker you know it's a very popular term currently I guess but I think that
helps particularly someone like me who's a hobbyist I'm not making a living doing
any of this stuff I can be quite broad in all the things that I make and I
guess so it's you need that general term to encompass the wide variety of
interests that I end up pursuing at any given time so yeah definitely a maker
The last proper project I guess was cupboard doors for my bathroom not the
most exciting sounding thing but I used the CNC machine to make this sort of
ripple effect on the doors it was ended up regretting it a little bit it's all
started because I've been renovating my house over the last few years and part
of what it encourages me towards making and DIY and listening stuff is is making
something exactly the way I want it so as part of doing that renovation I
changed the size of airing cupboard door to accommodate a radiator and all this
kind of stuff and then I should have forced myself into a now I have to make
a custom door that's like well if you're gonna make a custom door you might as
well make it interesting and so I kind of the first time round made this really
ridiculously overcomplicated I am milled a few hundred little oak strips into
ripples and glued all up I quite like the effect in the end but it took a
ridiculous a ridiculous amount of time and then of course I had made a basin
unit and I needed to put doors on that and so I ended up doing those that so
that was the more recent thing they took less time than the main door because I
glued them all up as a block and CNC - all in one go but they were still like
eight or nine hours of CNC per door plus sanding and finishing and such like so
that was that was a bit of an epic but it kind of worked out okay
Well that is a challenging thing to answer because I am a geek and I love
all of my tools My most recently tool is my new laser cutter which is really fun
to use really cool I get incredible I mean obviously it's very precise but
it's kind of amazing to work with something that's quite so incredible and
precise and that sort of fills out my digital fabrication set if you like of
having a 3d printer which I've had for a year or so and my trusty CNC machine
which I used online or project which are all very they appeal to the geek part of
me and the fact that I might day job is with computers and so like modeling and
stuff and producing CAD models and stuff that that is good and it an enjoyable
but but part of the the workshop thing to me is supposed to be an escape from
spending my life in front of a computer so I think I think actually I would
probably pick something like my welder as like my favorite tool because it's a
very visceral thing that you can do it's very exciting lots of sparks and you can
make make things really quickly that are super strong it's it's sort of a magical
tool to use I mean people refer to of them as like a hot glue gun for metal
but it's like it's even better than that you can you can stick two pieces of
metal together and grind them down and and make it so that it looks like it has
never been to different pieces of metal it's it's an extraordinary thing and if
you haven't had a chance to use a welder I really recommend it to anyone have a
go because it really is quite amazing to use
I really am terrible at picking favorites for things recently I made us
the series of blocks I have a couple here which I was really into they're
quite hard to describe though so but maybe that's part of what makes them my
favorite is that like they they really difficult put it on social media or on a
2d medium because they're built to be tactile so it's like this is it's one of
them it's predominantly solid and if you can hear I put a loose weight inside so
it's a cast block but I put a loose weight inside and so as you move it
around like weight shifts and there's like the sound and it's heavy and
tactile and it's quite pleasant to feel and I made a whole kind of set of them
and they they interlock with each other where I say interlock they tessellate in
various forms this one has a different colored core which I then carved through
to get to and it's also heavy and interesting and then I made a hollow one
so I kind of really got into making either day if that's gonna focus
properly but so this one is hollow and then I pierced into it and I just have
them on my desk at work normally and sort of fiddle with whilst I'm thinking
and I really like them but like when people see them on Instagram or whatever
the question is no no or what what are they it's like what are they for like
well how do you describe it they're not really anything they're just just for
holding and and like when I have given them physically to people in real world
they kind of get it then because you can kind of feel it but this doesn't really
make sense over video so they are probably my favorite project certainly
recently
but I'm trying to see I wear recency bias so thinking further back probably I
made a fire guard for our log burner and it was a welding project which was good
made out of just like six mil bar stock but I designed it to match the light
fittings in that room and so one things I like with making is is when an object
I make enters my life in some way like stays and is useful or is just around
and kind of has a place and that really has a place it sits in my living room I
I still look at it and quite pleased with the way it looks
so yeah it's probably longer term probably one of my favorite projects it
came out well it's the sort of thing that that people who don't care at all
about YouTube or making it or whatever will look at and go I get I understand
that it looks good alright so that was very pleasing
I mean power of the tool obsession is this like need to want to keep learning
different things and forgot to use them and make different stuff service that's
kind of a never-ending list but probably TIG welding like I love my MIG welder
and as I said it's a magical process but like when I see people take welding in
their YouTube channels and and kind of how delicate you can be with it as well
as quite make quite robust things like that it appeals to me something about
the precision and what you can do with that it really does seem like it could
be quite fun to use I just can't really justify it at the moment
buying another tool I mean that's always the that's always the challenge I don't
really have a product in mind but again it's one of those like I would love to
have a go and see see what comes a bit anyway thank you very much featuring the
makers Monday I really appreciate the chance to answer some questions and try
and think about what how I would answer some of these things because I don't
often think about favorites if anyone wants to try and find me hopefully it's
fairly obvious there'll be links down below I imagine make a geek on YouTube
maybe eat on Instagram I post more Instagram than I do to YouTube because
it's a lot easier to do that further in progress little ideas not everything
that I not every product I work on ever makes it to youtube so for more of
what's going on Instagram is definitely the place to go beer thank you for
watching and enjoy making
you