Marble Machine X - A Lesson in Dumb Design
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- Опубліковано 27 вер 2021
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- Dumb Design requirements are holding the Marble Machine X back from Success, lets see if we can at least try to learn something from my biggest mistakes :) �
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Isn't it annoying that we need to make mistakes like these ourselves before we can actually learn something? For me at least, it’s like I need to get painfully burned by something before my brain opens up. Most likely, bumpy road processes like these are unavoidable, especially when learning and trying new things.
I made this video in the hope that by describing the fearsome Form-and-perhaps-Function trap, perhaps some of you could avoid falling into it. If the Marble Machine X can provide that lesson, that’d be great! :)
Welcome back!
I'll point you to a song that has taught me a lot about exactly this and not be ashamed: The roses of success.
Marble Machine
I love these types of videos where you explain what needs to be done and what was done wrong
Design function and the form will come naturally
Drummers lose drum sticks. Violinists break bows. Guitarists lose picks.
The marble machine can drop a marble.
Right, and if it does, then design a felt trap to capture the marbles before they hit the floor.
I really believe this "zero marbles out of a million" is a very dumb requirement to begin with.
This is the correct answer. No musical instrument is perfect. The intimacy the musician has with their instrument overcomes any glitch or minor failure. Too much focus and obsession on the engineering. Are too many (very well meaning cooks) having a negative effect on Martin”s mindset?
Thank god it's not just me, these bots are everywhere, i got a comment on a different channel with 6 different bots
@@Shadow__X I report everyone I see but they are just getting worse
@@thomasr1051 I'm also reporting every of them, I hope at some point this starts being useful...
"I haven't been productive these last three years." - Man who has made over 200 videos and taught himself engineering from scratch in three years.
So you think he is now a self taught engineer correct? Brilliant musician yes; Martin changes his mind too often and in my opinion, listens too much to his ‘madding crowd’ to be described as an engineer.
@@adrianshingler9783 your reading comprehension is way to off for you to act so condescending.
@@ricebeansrockroll882 I have no idea what you are trying to say, but I have seen Martin play out live 5 years ago; he is a superb musician in my book, but please remind me, what are his engineering credentials? He has taken to ‘designing by committee’ and it never works trust me. He needs to finish his wonderful machine with all its imperfections, record a new album and get his backside out on tour. Also not a big fan of management psycho babble books either.
@@adrianshingler9783 He said you're bad at reading!
@@kakapofan6542 thanks for that 😎. What have I read wrong in the original comment exactly? Martin is not an accredited/qualified engineer as far as I am aware. He is an excellent musician however and should concentrate on recording and playing gigs now rather than embarking on yet another iteration of the marble machine - my opinion of course.
So it can cycle 80k marbles, enough to preform a super long song while only dropping 3 or 4 marbles, but it is a "failure" sir what you have is one of the coolest long running projects on the platform. We'd be happy to at the very least see it play a single song (like the original) before moving on to the next project. Just having it sit there, silently, so close to completion is torture.
Edit: I just came back after watching the restoration team's attempt to play the original song on the MMX. I had no idea the machine was in that bad of shape, from the videos all seemed to be going well. That was... Rough to say the least...
It USE to do that. Now it drops tens of hundreds if the problems happens. It functionally breaks the machine. Granted you can definitely throw together some fixes for a couple of the issues idk about all, which he definitely SHOULD do because everybody wants that, but it’s still a much bigger issue
You seem to have missed the part that once he adds the bass and the drum kit then entire machine broke down because of the volume of marbles. That issue is only going to get exponentially worse when the vibraphone gets added.
@@xristosdomini7249 I feel like you could solve that by making 3 machines playing in tandem. It's like cpus - if you can't make them do one thing faster, make them do 8 things at the same time.
@@emissarygw2264 -- that's essentially what they have been playing around with in CAD, supposedly. They went through a couple week process where they realized they were married to the archetype of the first machine and they needed to start the design from scratch, then form-from-function their way to a more compact machine. Make it work, then make it pretty.
@@xristosdomini7249 cool. Well, I hope they get somewhere with it... It's kind of living the dream for me, I love the concept of marble machines and animusic was one of my fav things from childhood. Hurts to think that they might take another 5 years or so, it's always seemed like they were right on the cusp of being ready to do some sort of showcase.
Over engineering for design didn't kill this project. Perfectionism killed it. The point of the MMX machine was for it to look awesome and play music. If you are going to create something using perfect design than why not just use normal instruments to do the job and remove the marbles all together? Because the marble making music was the point. This was about creating art visually and musically and creating something that shouldn't be possible. To me this project was probably 99% complete if the creator could look past the slim failure rate of loosing marbles once and a while. The abandonment of this project saddens me. I loved this while it lasted.
How to do that?
Exactly my reaction. This isn't a space rocket. It's a pointless marble music machine. Having pointless requirements is essential. Quite frankly, I'm not interested in a lesser, simpler version. The original was amazing for its ingenuity and dedication. The MMX was a fascinating study in creating the most elaborate version of that idea. It just needed to get finished.
@@edwardchester1 It appears that we may have projected our ideals onto his art. There is value in what we wanted for it since some of us helped fund it, but he put thousands of hours into it and his vision was more functional. That vision likely developed as he realized how seriously he was taking the project.
I agree. I think the artistic overcomplicated beauty is just as important as the function of the machine. To me the heart and soul of this project is marble machine x. Its whimsical, it is not supposed to be about some scientifically well engineered machine of robust dumb boring modern design. There is artistic beauty in organizing the chaos of the marbles in unique creative ways. Im afraid that even if a touring version is more reliable and functional it may lose the heart and artistic beauty of the project. It will still be cool im sure. It is just that it wont be the same. The machine is meant to be steampunk creative and non essential. Not a product of perfect design of function over form.
Isn't the problem that "looking awesome" makes bad music? I feel like that was the entire point of the video. Marbles dropping on floor makes it so it won't be able to play for very long and it will make noise as well. And there were probably some other problems that made it function worse as well.
Martin, do you remember why people fell in love with the original Marble Machine? We all looked at this hodgepodge of untreated wood and metal marbles and thought "what on earth could *this* possibly accomplish?"
And then it made music, and we were astonished. It was messy, it was flawed, it looked like it might completely fall apart after two or three uses and we laughed at the sea of marbles on the floor at the end of the video, and yet there it was, playing music for us, and the music was beautiful. It was impressive because it looked like such an inefficient, unlikely way to do what it set out to do, and yet it worked. It did its thing. That it worked to any degree at all is what made it incredible.
As far as I knew, what you intended to do with the MMX all along was to create another machine like that, that wouldn't fall apart after three uses, so that you could reuse it and make different music with it. You have basically accomplished that. This machine *will* work if you put the finishing touches to it. You *can* make beautiful music on it, and it *will* be impressive. It will not be perfect, because it was never supposed to be. It never could be. You are not an engineer making a top of the art space ship with a billion dollar budget, you are an artist making an intentionally inefficient musical instrument out of sheer love and passion.
Don't forget why you wanted to build this in the first place.
ditto.
I loved the old one more this one is all most too much machine like too much precise thou it is still amazing work
@@shark_in_a_chair4238 Yea but the old one cant even make it through one song without failing, the popular marble machine video was a mashup of several different takes
@@Faramik2000 Ya i found that out later still was a fun ride while it lasted
Indeed, it reminds me of a Dr. Seuss type machine, barely holding on and absurd. But that's what gives it the charm it holds
Although obsessing too much over the looks of the MMX is obviously not great, completely ignoring its looks and never trying any of those "because it looks cool" unsuccessful ideas is just as bad. If all the MMX was about was performing music, you may as well just play some Midi music from a speaker and be done with it. The whole reason for making a marble machine play music is because it is aesthetically cool.
In the case of making rockets, there is a solid set of metrics to work towards, where everything else must be discarded for them (move stuff off the planet, as safely and as cheaply as possible). With the MMX, if the only important thing were to produce music using marbles without dropping any, then there would be no reason to have the instruments, just a bunch of digital sensors for the marbles to hit, and a way to bring them back up to them. Hell, you wouldn't even need to recycle the marbles, it could just be a feeding tank above and a collection tank below that could be swapped between tracks. Much more simple and reliable. But the MMX, like the original MM, looks hella cool and that is a big reason we love them. Yes, it working is the most important thing, but not even attempting anything interesting because there is a risk that it won't be possible betrays the fact that it looking cool is, in fact, important.
Everybody, please help getting this comment to the top so Martin sees it!
Very well said. I support Martin and love this community, but I can't help but feel a bit sad after this video.
Amen.
I could not agree more. Why would you want to build an overcomplicated machine if it doesn't look cool? The MMX isn't a mechanical synthesizer, it's a mechanical piece of art.
Of course Martin needs to be (more) realistic, but I still think some of his ideas are genuinly cool (especially the magnetic lift!)
definitely agree, beautifully put.
And thus is the story of the artist so obsessed with making his art perfect that he became a master of creating it and ultimately forgot the reason he and his audience loved it in the first place
What breaks my heart looking back on this 3 months later is all the engineers and instrument makers (namely the bass guitar) who lovingly made components for this machine. I truly believe the only person who thought this machine needed to be perfect was Martin. It was a wild dream to begin with. People don't love this machine because it's the perfect piece of engineering. We all believed in a machine that was a million times better than the original, but nobody ever thought it had to be perfect.
Exactly. 100% correct.
Martin and the idiots he listened to
I thought the same. Martin had people who were deeply motivated by the project itself. Something that Elon Musk will never have despite all his money, because you cannot buy motivation. Martin has made the biggest mistake in his life, by stopping the project and hitting all the people who were dedicated to the MMX straight into the face. Who would ever trust him once he comes back?
Its not about making it "perfect" or "flawless", its about making it usable, for multiple concerts without having to essentially take apart and rebuild the entire thing between concerts. Hes not making art here, hes building an instrument, so usability and functionality is as important here as the easthetic
Yeah this is actually tragic. So many hours of careful, expert work which people donated for free which will never see the performance they were built for :(
I'll confess that we don't have the same objectives for the MMX. I wanted to watch an artist engineer his way out of the most absurd project requirements, because that is something that has never been accessible to me. Coming along for the ride while you learn, refine, implement, test and repeat was an experience that felt communal, because it's nice to know I'm not the only one who enjoys solving a puzzle of his own design, simply because the challenge has been conceived. I appreciate the hours of unseen work put into every camera angle, every light position, every edit, and the results speak for themselves: you built a community from sharing yourself with us. The side adventures, like building the studio, were all a part of the story, not a distraction from the primary objective.
It was never about seeing the machine finished. I was never frustrated by any lack of progress, but I was delighted to watch you iterate until you found a nexus of art and engineering, design and fabrication, problem and solution, and then find out next week that it has evolved yet again! Your willingness to ponder a decision, revisit, and accept that you can do better, then following through with better, and doing it in public, takes courage and resilience. It sounds like you feel that these are signs of weakness or failure, but life will teach you that humility, self-reflection, and embracing change when you recognise the value despite the effort it will require are the skills that will make you successful in what really matters.
If creating these videos, sharing this process with us, is not what you want from life, it would be unrealistic and selfish to expect you to continue. Good for you for pursuing your goals, but it feels melancholy. Don't let Elon optimise the artist out of you, and don't let capitalism be the lens through which you view measure success. It will never value creativity over productivity, which is part of the magic of the MMX.
His "tunnel" is a perfect example of the conman fraud Elon truly is. Martin is insane for wasting his time on that charlatan.
+1
Very well said!!
Sir I believe this is the best summarized view of the collective feelings on this video. I hope he takes advice like this to heart.
Great encouragement along with inspiration said there !! Our dog-legged determination helps us achieve such goals👍
Martin, as an engineer myself, I believe you're doing a mistake here by scrapping the MM-X project. The almost perfect solution is still 100% better than no solution. Some things are meant to be created with a "looks cool, perhaps functioning" mindset, because that's maybe the reason the thing exists in the first place. I believe MM-X perfectly falls under this category. After all, you're basically creating a musical instrument for yourself only, you're not going to mass produce it or something, it doesn't need to be 100% perfect. It doesn't fall apart, you know how to use and tweak it to make it work, it is capable of making music, so it absolutely does what it has to do. And people love it because you made it, and because it's a unique piece of art and engineering, not because it's ready for mass production.
And stop comparing your project with what Elon does. While building rockets they absolutely must do everything perfectly, otherwise, people would die and billions and billions of dollars will be wasted. The rocket industry was and will always be this way. But that doesn't mean that everything we do should be treated as rocket industry, you don't need to be that hard on yourself. And don't forget that even though you have a team, most of this thing was made by you alone, and it comes nothing near what Elon has. I pretty much believe that if Elon wished to make this machine, it would be made in less than a week with all the people and resources he has. You're not Elon Musk, and neither you should be him.
I believe you should try to do world tour with what you have done before scrapping it away. MM-X may be underperforming according to your expectations, but it is absolutely normal for everything people make. Yes, mistakes were done, but none of them are fundamental and none of them are bad enough to completely scrap the project. So, in my opinion, it's unwise to do so, all you need to do is to stop begin a perfectionist, just deal with the fact that it's not perfect and do the tour with what you have.
Also as an engineer,......I think Martin you are thinking too much!. Part of it's function is that it looks cool, otherwise why build it?!... just have solenoids pressing synth keys!!
Agreed..Maybe the 100% perfection goal is a dumb requirement?
@@shadyfishr Perhaps a misinterpreted requirement....I think Martin is too quick to blaming his own actions of "looks over function" on the failures occurring along the way. The point of such a music machine is to be appealing and to have the 'machine-like' feel to it, rather than just a functioning structure that is able to make music. Your purpose seems to be drifting askew, Martin!
As an engineer, I agree. Martin is burying himself in the pursuit of perfection, when perfection isn’t a requirement. There are other issues at work here.
@@motor2of7 That was very well put :)
Martin, I have to be honest: I'm crushed. I watched the first episode of this series on the day it came out and have seen nearly every episode since (excluding the +45 minute ones). I'm going to echo what everyone else is saying here in the hopes that it might make some ounce of difference for you. The machine will NEVER be perfect. Please don't abandon the MMX. If you make an MMX-T, cool. But no matter what, please finish the MMX and play something with it. Anything. A real piece that takes advantage of the full capabilities of this wonderful creation. Without much engineering experience and a jigsaw, you completed the last machine, and it literally used LEGOs. I think everyone here is more disappointed that it isn't going to be finished than we are that you don't want to take it on tour.
Please hear what everyone is saying. We care about you and this machine. We're here because we believe in what you're doing.
He's going to finish it. He's just not going on a tour with it. See 14:27.
@@Uthael_Kileanea A bit scammy
The thing other commenters have stated and I will repeat: THIS MACHINE IS ART. Jank and chaos is part of it. you are not building a rocket. you are building a timed marble-dropper. it is going to spill marbles. it is going to break and need to be fixed ten minutes before the show with duct tape. It is an art project and you are an artist. you can minimize its failures and fail gracefully. when every ball is dropped in the machine it is a leap of faith. that moment of suspension of midair before the ball hits the drum or the string is the art. because anything can happen, including failure. that cannot be engineered out of the MMX in a thousand revisions.
The problem is, the whole machine is sub-optimal. The artistic approach is the whole point. Form from function will lead you to a synthesizer.
Honestly, he's playing music with marbles! That's really not the optimal solution, so he's building a machine to do so. Following Musks 5 steps, the whole idea is "dumb"
except a synth is function over form. it is literally the lack of artistry
@@natalieisagirlnow That was literally his point.
A marble machine is a dumb requirement, and you can tackle that and that's ok. What is dumber is to add so many more dumb requirements on top of that.
@@natalieisagirlnow yes, but with a twist. Speaking of synthesizers. When Jean-Michel Jarre went on his Oxygene Tour (which I saw in april 2008), it was with the original old synthesizers from 1977. These machines are, by todays standards, really not "functional", but prone to all kinds of errors, failures and random behaviour. I think he actually warned us (the audience) at the start of the concert. Of course it all came out great. There may have bern problems, bit I don't remember noticing any.
As far as I can tell, the MMX is right now in a state where it could easily match that level.
Oh, and wrt catastrophic marble spills: Martin needs a "litterbox", a double floor and box, with a level perforated raised floor plate, and a tilted plate below collecting all fallen marbles into one or more corners. The frame should be wide enough to catch most marbles. I don't have any resources to make this, but he needs it, no more Gollum impersonations please.
As an engineer I'm happy to see him learning from his mistakes, but part of me really loves the pure improbably, precarious, ridiculous, rube-goldbergesque look and function of this thing. I think that's a large part of it's appeal. Because if you're really going for pure function, we already have computers that allow you to create music. This isn't just a function, it's art, and art IS form. I hope what he has learned is not to ignore form totally, but the insight to know which design decisions could result in complete catastrophe when function is placed second.
I will never, ever understand or agree with the decision to abandon this project. So many people have poured a lot of care, devotion, skill, time and money into this project, only for it to be cast aside due to unrealistic perfectionism. I know this sounds dramatic but it truly feels like a betrayal.
If you take away all the "dumb requirements" you just have a bunch of instruments. You say dumb requirements, I say ART. youre equal parts musician, engineer, and artist. the MMX is a masterpiece
That's it, tbh even the idea of using marbles was a beautiful crazy idea from the start
The requirement you should drop is 'It has to be perfect'. Take the machine on tour, try to play songs with it, any marbles that escape become souvenirs for the crowd. If the machine breaks down completely it becomes the art piece back drop for the rest of your concert played with regular instruments. I'd still buy tickets to your concert just to see that.
Havent thought about that yet. It‘s kinda eye opening and even falls into the „elon principles“: have guts to challange the professors questions. Martin isn‘t trying to go to frikkin Mars. No lifes are at risk here. It‘s „just“ music and art. So yeah, I personally would love him to continue without the desire for perfection. That being said, I don‘t question his decision.
Could not have said it better. An adventure is something that involves the unknown, or risk. If you take the marble machine on tour, imperfect as it may be, there will be challenges and problems. They will not break shows, but rather people would be thrilled to take home a dropped marble as a souvenir or watch you fix a broken machine. It's a performance! It would be much more memorable being at a concert where the MMX breaks down halfway through a song and improvisation happened than to witness a flawless concert.
The self-help books (and people like musk) are toxic to your art. Just follow your initial vision and believe in yourself.
marbles escaping is certainly a safety issue venues would be more than pleased to waive 🙄
@@reneeschke And art is ABOUT doing it the hard/unusual/useless way for fun. Otherwise he would just record on a MIDI keyboard and his concerts would just be clicking play on a computer.
What a great idea! Who wouldn't want one of the marbles from the show?
The problem is that you aren’t eliminating the #1dumb requirement: perfection. The MMX is more art than engineering science and art is rarely perfect, but it’s the imperfections that give art its soul.
So much of engineering is designing systems that if they fail cause thousands of dollars in damage in the best case and thousands of human lives in the worst case. SpaceX is trying to solve the hardest problem in the world in the cheapest way possible and every system on Starship will ultimately be responsible for people's lives. The MMX on the other hand takes a well-solved problem and attempts to solve it again in the most beautifully impractical way possible. It does not have to be completely reliable. Honestly having floor marbles during a world tour only enhances the whimsical nature of such a device and I highly doubt anyone in the audience will care.
If you take just one thing from the field of engineering, you should know that you should expect everything to fail sometime, and then you can work towards making it fail in the least catastrophic way. If a failure cannot result in the entire machine breaking, I honestly don't think much time should be put into fixing it.
Indeed. This^^
Your pursuit for perfection is the main thing holding you back!
If you want to ‘simplify’, go ‘back to basics’ and consider your S.M.A.R.T targets . . . . . The A and R fall foul to the #1 dumb requirement of perfection.
Even the worlds greatest pianists don't play every piece to perfection. If they did they would be a computer not a person.
Exactly. Accept to make your machine imperfect (e.g. by leaving the magnet lift unused and building a new system on the side), and you will make it work like a charm !
Agree, dumb priority is to expect all the marbles to never fall out ever. It's physics, crazy things happen that are sometimes uncontrollable. Crazy thing is that first machine only exists because Martin was willing to accept that marbles would fall and it would not be perfect. It was great anyways.
Don't forget that "because it looks cool" is a completely valid design requirement for an artistic project! Elon's rockets are practical in the extreme and not even slightly constrained by aesthetic appeal. "Make requirements less dumb" is a fantastic approach, but please don't forget that "looks cool" is not a dumb requirement for your project.
Hate the comparison to the egoist billionaire but your point still stands and I agree full heartedly
@@fannin8583 Find it odd that you are calling him "egotistical" meanwhile he is spending billions on his company that is building the first ever fully re-usable launch vehicle ever made to help humanity colonise mars...
@@Theironminer-ky2pg its not the first, but its good hes pushing the field and getting ppl interested in space travel again. if humans are to survive as a species we much become a space faring one.
@@hellspawn3200 Although not the first re-usable one (With the space shuttle and buran), However, Those still need new fuel tanks in order to fly. Starship is 100% re-usable. There is also the discussion on wether or not space shuttle and buran where re-usable.
Too late he forgot that a while ago
This is the story of an artist who became an engineer to build his art and in so doing forgot the meaning of art
Its a sad tale
Exactly, well said.
I disagree. This is the story of an artist who became an engineer, and ended up doing neither very well.
There is a saying: "a dog that chases two rabbits will catch neither".
.. is learning to be an engineer. Sadly hasn't yet learned all lessons and has more to learn, seems he is currently repeating some previous mistakes again despite so many people warning him. As the old saying goes, none so deaf as those who won't listen
@@MatConlon "A jack of all trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one."
Dude, advice from an engineer: your machine is art, so looks, sound, coolness are really important! Technical constrains will exist watever you do. Focus your budget into making it work first (of course), but do not give up on coolness. It is your selling point.
It could work better if you had just some boring string of marbles falling from a shelf into a keyboard, but no one would care to watch that, would they?
If your throughput is too hight, duplicate the bottlenecks and assemble them in parallel. What youre doing is amazing! Don't give up!
Elon is a smart guy, but he's a manager. The manager will scrap everything if he can sell what's left. Listen the engineer, the artist AND the manager.
The bottleneck of the wheels could be avoided by extending the This Old Tony elevator down to the lowest point on the marble run.
so much what Andre said. The MMX isn't a a product you need to make in an most efficient way in the less time than possible. The Journey and the videos are part of the art, even as the look of the machine is part of the product.
In my opinion the MMX is not only a music instrument but also a piece of art. Reducing it to an instrument would destroy an essential part of the MMX
Elon is not just a penny pinching manager. He launched his own car into space on top of his biggest rocket, just because..
He currently produces the fastest accelerating production car in the world, just because.
However, SpaceX designs their systems with failure as an option. I think that is the real lesson Martin needs to take away from Elon. Looks cool, works well, doesn't fail catastrophically. Doesn't need to be 100% reliable. Fix the sub-systems that fail, and move forward.
@@techdaemn To add to your point about designing with failure as an option: it's always good to design things to 'fail gracefully'. So when a failure does inevitably occur, it remains relatively isolated and doesn't take the rest of the proverbial ship down with it. Also, make things modular whenever possible. That way a failing/damaged module can be easily replaced without major disassembly or readjustment.
Quick someone get him a book about making things beautiful, and the beauty in teaching others, and the amazingness of doing things others can't or won't.
Ha! I had the same thought watching the video.
I'm sure there's some cheesy pop-sci or business book out there about "perfect being the enemy of good" that we can sneak into his library.
lol, seriously, martin should stop reading those awful soulless selfhelp books for yuppies. What's gonna be next, "The Millionaire Father"?
the most heartbreaking part about this is that elon and these other "motivational" "self help" people seem to have completely erased the fact from Martins mind that this marble machine is imperfect and it always will be and that is WHY it needs to be finished. the dumb design requirements are necessary because it's only impressive if something works despite dumb requirements. the only true dumb design requirement here is perfection. if you wanted perfection you should've made a marble run along a circular tube and every time it crosses a sensor it plays a note on a synth. there is the perfection and function over form result with no dumb design requirements. but that's boring. the reason we all wish this would continue so much is because its a challenge, because its interesting and because it is a work of art. don't try to function over form on a work of art.
If we are talking about dumb design requirements, the Marble Machine in and of itself is entirely composed of dumb design requirements, since making music through the use of marbles is an utterly illogical and inefficient method. However, the point of art is not that it is useful for any particular purpose or objective, just merely that it exists, and to stoke our bewilderment at how that might possibly be. When one looks at the original Marble Machine for the first time, they are stunned not by merely a pleasant tune or the complexity of its design, but rather by the fact that such a ramshackle contraption can create a marvelous and delightful melody despite its inherent inefficiencies. Art is completely superfluous and contradictory to logic, to desperately try to iron out all of the "dumb design requirements" in this project is a fools erand. Even if you succeeded, such success would leave you with something that is fundamentally different than what the Marble Machine is, and what art is meant to be.
@@nootboot9744 exactly
Beautifully put!
There is a large difference between making a concept less dumb and completely throwing out the concept. What he's making is a mechanical marvel that run on marbles. There is a broad range of outcomes that will retain that. To say that it's only special if all of its workings are bad is a disservice imo. He absolutely should change some areas that are holding the design back if their specific design isn't a critical contributor to the marvel of it all. From that, there is so much that can change for the better and still blow our minds.
Please don't blame Martin's misinterpretations on Elon Musk.
He's completely lost sight of the artistry in some techbro-brainwashed crusade for unattainable standards of flawless perfection and it's just so sad to watch. It's a marble machine. The POINT is to be a fantastical kludge that makes kinetic art and music yet here we are watching Martin throw three years of toil on the pyre in the name of some silicon valley doubletalk about "optimization". And he's being groomed by crypto grifters that are going to bleed him (and the rest of you) dry.
At this rate why not just compose on the computer, man?
Couldn't agree more.
In his defence: He wants the machine to be able to go on a world tour without constant issues, which requires a good degree of optimization
In Elon’s defence: Elon’s advice doesn’t work here because Elon is making a rocket ship, not art, everything needs to be as functional as possible
I am an engineer myself, but I would rather look at a beautiful but slightly quirky machine out of the brain of one inspired artist than at a music making robot concieved by a team of down to earth engineers. The machine has to be imperfect to be beautiful, otherwise it won't be a band member, it will just be a backing track.
Totally agree. If function over looks is a priority - just use a midi keyboard.
It's an art sculpture and musical instrument, it's quirky looks and way of working IS it's purpose.
If music was the priority, a drummer, basist and keyboard player would perform much better and more flexibly, and cheaper, than the MMX
@@hanvyj2 but in the end you as artist want a music instrument that works, cause the real art is what you play with it and not how your instrument looks like
@@certhass that works, but does it need to be perfect? Martin called it "nearly perfect". You can make great music and art on something "nearly perfect", I'd argue the imperfection adds to character which is why Martin has used such interesting, imperfect instruments in the past.
Martin called it "nearly perfect" but that's not good enough. I'd argue it is, and it's imperfections are part of its charm and attraction.
It needs to be good enough to function well enough to play, and it seems that way to me. Martin just considers a single droped marble out of 10,000 "not perfect" and thus not good enough, when in reality, who cares if it misses one note and drops 3 marbles in a song during a live show?
People love the project because of the imperfections and excentricities. The project IS a big excentricity. Remove that part of it, which is incompatible with this new philosophy of essentialism, and it looses all its artistic value.
@@hanvyj2 Moreover, would Wintergatan's audience really mind that much if they had to stop in the middle of a song because the machine jammed up? Maybe if it kept happening, but one time in a dozen plays is totally forgivable. Martin may be letting perfect be the enemy of good enough.
I think he could just use a different material for the parts that keep breaking. Maybe have machined metal entries at the start of the PLA tubing so that the entry impacts are negated.
Elon would probably say to ditch the marbles: they are noisy, heavy, unpredictable and attracted to floors.
Delete the marbles, next delete the machine and replace it all with a computer yeah. Far superior functionality... just won't draw in as much of a crowd.
he would have promised 800mph marbles in a vacuum then delivered marbles dropped in a pvc pipe
Here's a new thought : instead of marbles, how about water ?
Drops of falling water could play vibraphone, drums and even strings, just need amplifiers to boost the sound. It would be a genuine " Singing Waterfall " .
P.S. Water won't get jammed, and a pump can look really cool.
He would also get a team of smarter people to do all the work for him while he exploits their labor and forces them to work during a global pandemic
If the marbles are big enough they also break windows on expensive concept cars...
Just popping in to say that I miss this channel and the MMX journey. I hope you're doing well, Martin!
After going back and rewatching the first marble machine, it was amazing to see the flaws and inaccuracies. Its mistakes and errors is what GAVE it character and to be able to play a badass song at the end of the day makes the video deserve 100 million views. The unstable amalgamation of math and engineering to create something humans are known for, music.
I know I'm 2 years late (who the hell cares?), but you are so totally wrong here. The first MM couldn't even play a "badass song" reliably and consistently. The fact the video literally took like 2 months to film, for just a 3 or 4-minute piece of music, says a lot. In reality, what we all heard in that first MM video was all of the best takes spliced together. It was a great publicity stunt, though. Nothing more. Of course we should applaud the fact it even worked at all, but that's just not good enough if this thing were to actually perform as a legitimate musical instrument.
Please, do not let your infatuation with the MM prevent you from seeing the real story.
HARD disagree on the videos being "tediously repetitive" and non-essential. We're here for the journey, and the videos are _THE_ primary way for us to do so! Bumps and all, not just the smoothed over and already iterated final result.
Seconding that. We're all in this together - and the design process is never smooth.
I too loved following the process, and some of the engineering principles blew my mind. Their demonstrated effectiveness made the aesthetic appeal of the machine more satisfying for me.
Exactly
however, his point of shallow vs deep work is very valid: we'll still enjoy his videos, arguably even more, if he gets to focus on what he's doing, achieve the results he wants, and then retroactively goes over it in a video. at least I would. out of all the points he mentioned in this video, that is the most valid one
If I had a dollar for every video it's content creator depreciated but which gave me incredible inside and deeper understanding and ideas, man, I could fund a school dedicated to just that.
"Looks Cool" isn't a dumb requirement in this case. This is an art project as much as an engineering project.
I would have to say that this was an art project BEFORE this was an engineering project and from the sounds of it, the MMX-T will be the opposite, Engineering before Art and that kinda makes me sad.
Precisely. The shortest distance between two points is a direct line -- coloring the line doesn't make it art. The first MM was like hand-drawing an artful line. MMX is like adding automation and precision to the drawing process. MMXT is about to sacrifice the ability to make artful lines in order to focus on making straight ones extremely well. You get to point B alright, but you lose the art.
@@frankmthompson MMX is absolutely a work of art, and that's what makes it so wonderful. But I have to sympathise with Martin on one point: a work of art is not a good companion for a world tour. Which is the same reason the original machine wasn't suitable for touring. Having a machine that arrives at each gig in working order is critical.
@@KalonOrdona2 you're so right. i'm sitting here like 10 min in the video with my jaw open. wtf? if he wanted function, he could have bought a robot. or a synthesizer. or a mp3 player. or just any other commercially available thing. wtf?
@@merreborn Sure, and I even think it could be ok to make a touring version, as long as it's just that, but I see the focus turning away from the magic, making it a thing to move on from rather than the thing itself. "Do a song on it and move on" is just sad and a poor exchange for a "more functional" player-piano.
I hate being a dick in the comments and I truly wish Martin the best but after reading his blog post he has clearly lost touch with what made this project interesting. Sad to see it end like this after looking forward to it every week.
what was the initial appeal of the project?
@@pants1403 a work of art, and the artist dedicated to bringing his vision into reality, whether or not it was reasonable or truly destined to be consistent
I stopped watching and unsubscribed nearly two years ago (I found this video when I became curious enough to check in again); the weekly updates had become a depressingly painful documentation of a doomed process. Martin had become focused on achieving an unreasonable degree of perfection, seemingly ignored all warnings (and corrections to his misunderstandings) people offered, and sunk increasing amounts of time and attention into redesigning already implemented parts instead of adding the various missing parts.
@@BainesMkII Funny enough I was curious where he was now. Can't believe it's been months
@@BainesMkII Same, basically. I'd seen a few of his videos, liked the original, but knew this was a documentation of obsession over minutia and doomed to failure.
There hasn’t been a new wintergatan episode in more than 3 months and this makes me so freaking sad.
Winds of Winter, Doors of Stone, Wintergatan.
I feel like every 3 months Martin reads a book about the design process, watches a video or just listens to a podcast and then rethinks everything he is doing
This is definitely not a bad thing btw. I envy his ability to be constantly improving himself and everything he is doing
@@McMods2332 The disruption of each process change could be more expensive than its potential savings.
@@McMods2332 This is definetely a bad thing.
i mean this whole project is the definition of feature creep
It's ironic that he talks so much much about being unproductive in the video based on reading a bunch of self-help books, when those self-help books seem to be the main cause of his problems in the first place.
It’s hard not to see this video as a walking away from what made this channel successful. We don’t want just another pretty melody or a perfect machine.
We want art in motion, to capture the awe we felt in the first marble machine video.
I agree. Why not an mp3 player.. playing music with marbles is dumb? This could be slippery slope?
I don't think that Martin is willing - or will be able - to suppress his artist's heart when building the MMX-T. The new machine will lose unnessecary complexities, sure, to make sure that it works, but I am also sure that it will be still a visual marble marvel.
@@rolfborchmann3783 Agreed. This is not the first time Martin has said any of these things. All he can do is repeatedly move slightly toward function over form; move slightly toward producing less youtube videos. There's no way he'll forget aesthetics and presentation entirely.
A machine which plays music with marbles “perfectly” will be beautiful almost by definition. The
I don't think that's what he intends. He just want to have enough space to focus on making the very things that "originally" made this channel successful. And as many pointed out, given Martin penchant for aesthetics, *will* surely contain a massive cool factor.
As much as I love this guy and what he has done, I think his biggest problem is that he’s a perfectionist. I would sometimes get annoyed by it when I would watch his videos. With all the work he put into it already- I think giving up is a bit of a cop out and if he learned to let go of his need for perfectionism he would quite literally be getting out of his own way. Said with much love and respect for what he has accomplished.
He is not a perfectionist. But he plays one on youtube to better hype his videos.
If I can offer one piece of advice in how to proceed with the XT version, it's to consult with a pinball machine manufacturer on building wire channels. They have the equipment and experience in designing and welding these tubes together using chromed steel. These will not only work better than PMA tubes, but look better as well. And they can CAD design the support brackets as well, or at least provide the knowledge for you and your teams to do so.
Sorry Martin, but I'm gonna echo so many other people in this comment section. The MMX is an outstanding machine from an engineering standpoint, but it's a piece of art first and foremost. Like another commenter said, if you only cared about efficiency you'd just play your music from a speaker and not build anything.
Is the MMX ridiculous? Hell yeah it is, that's what makes it a masterpiece. I understand your concerns about its reliability while touring but, don't let cold, soulless mathematics completely destroy what the whole point of building the machine has always been in the first place: creating something beautiful.
A guitar string might snap during a concert, that doesn't mean the guitar design was dumb or not properly engineered. Mathematical perfection simply does not exist.
You're an artist Martin, and an incredible one, too. Please don't stop listening to your heart.
This is exactly what I wanted to say, only you put it into words better than I could have. Your comment deserves a great many more likes than it has so far gotten.
Beautifully written, my friend. I really hope Martin sees this
Absolutely, the first machine was a kitetic sculpture in essense, they're not perfectly functional. I do understand the importance though that the "marbles must flow" as he does need a reliable music machine inside of the artwork.
Welcome back! I think that possibly most of people here are just enjoying the process and hopefully learning something in consequence of it. It's helping me to think more "out of the box" and it's a great thing for a woodworker. Anxious for new videos. Best regards from Brazil
Form from function doesn't preclude form. I have every bit of confidence that if he starts with a device that is 100% reliable and plays music EXACTLY the way he wants, he can progress from there and introduce form back in.
Martin, you need to get out of the toxic "productivity" community. The "product" of your channel is beauty.
By the way, the mantra of "form follows function" is *one* way of approaching design, definitely not the only one
Watch him completely ignore all of these comments :/
The product he’s making is getting dollars out of patreons en masse for procrastinating, and you are falling for it
@@zendesigner I was a patron, and yes, I did pay Martin for what you call procrastinating. I don't actually care that much about a finished MMX, I paid a few dollars a month on Patreon because the videos were so great. If you ask me, he could just have continued for years, building fun stuff and making great videos about it.
@@Friek555 as long as you are happy with it
Have you considered that the necessity to have perfect timing, perfect sound production, and insane reliability are actually the problematic constraints in your design? To quote Elon Musk "your requirements are definitely dumb".
Musicians aren't perfect, and neither should a musical machine.
he will present the new MMX at the Fyre Festival in summer 2022!
Tickets starting at € 5,000 (including two pieces of bread, a can of tuna and an air mattress)
You may see it as having been a ‘non-essential commitment’ and ‘shallow multitasking’, but the video series you’ve produced during this process is as fascinating as it is educational. It’s a work of art in its own right, and a beacon of creativity for others.
edit: spelling
Exactly. You are not building MMX. MMX builds you and we are watching that. You are the work of art yourself.
It's also the reason so many people are supporting the project
*beacon
*beacon
*bacon
Martin,
In the beginning of the video I thought "wow, this approach is such a great tool, I wonder what we can achieve with it". But the further into the video I got, the more I started thinking about it and thinking it through, and the more irritated I started to become, until I couldn't hold it together anymore. I'm not even halfway through, yet I have to get this off my chest now.
I have been a subscriber of this channel from the beginning of the MMX project, and I've loved every bit of it. The videos are what got me interested, the videos are what has kept me here. They are one of you greatest resources, don't skimp on them, even though you might think they are only a shallow byproduct. No, they're not. I think they are in a way more important than the resulting machine in the end. They are a source of so much learning and inspiration for so many people. That's not to say your focus should be to produce flashy videos with great production quality, not at all. Keep everything as it is or change it up a little, we all don't really care, I think. But you should also not skimp on them to focus more on the machine itself.
On to the machine itself:
What fascinates me so much about this machine is primarily the ridiculous pointlessness of it all. Playing music with marbles, why would anyone do that? It's the creative, quirky solutions to stupid little problems, it's the mechanical, archaic, steampunky aesthetic of the machine. It's why I joined the CAD team last year, because it's so beautiful and fascinating to me.
Yet all of this completely clashes with Elons approach. Everything that makes this machine so great is at acute risk of being cannibalized by Elons approach. This is not a music machine first, it's a piece of art first. Otherwise it wouldn't need to exist in the first place.
Please don't jeopardize the soul of this machine by making everything less dumb. It's beautiful, because it's dumb.
Yours,
InterFelix
You summed it up perfectly and it is, just really sad tbh
I agree with you. However, it’s been 5 years and he hasn’t made any music or done any concerts. He is getting older and what’s there to show for it with regard to his primary passion of being a musician? However, the real question is, how long will he stick to this before he goes back to his old ways?
I feel like no one in the comments have ever engineered anything in their life. A lot of times, fixing a problem will cause three other problems. Fixing one of the three problems will produce three more problems. The engineer gets trapped in an endless loop of problems causing more problems. The only way to solve it is to not cause the original problem in the first place. Which is why he wants to simply redesign the whole thing again. He's simply spent too much time in the loop and wants out. You guys simply do not understand what it's like to be trapped in that loop. People like to dream about the day they solve every single problem, but it simply isn't realistic. Engineers aren't stupid, they have their reasons.The loop really is a nightmare.
@@chen-yumau1913 Exactly! It's the fallacy of thinking function and form are mutually exclusive, something Martian bought into early on and has since matured greatly in his understanding because of this project and its failures.
People need to realize that he is building an analog programmable music machine driven by marbles. That is going to have interesting and ascetically pleasing solutions even if he completely ignores form (which he isn't). The next marble machine is going to be much better in both form and function _because_ of his more principled approach.
I agree... When he got to his improvised gym I just couldn't stand it anymore. He lost it and boy i really do hope he finds whatever it is that inspired him to do art once again.
"It's particularly dangerous if a smart person gave you the advice. You might not question it enough." Do you want to be an architect that makes engineering beautiful. Or an engineer that makes a soulless machine that works perfectly. We have came so far. Its such a beautiful thing to throw away. Why give it up now?
Of course you'd respond that way, with your obvious naivety. Oh well. There's a lot of emotion-driven crap in this community anyway, so I'm not surprised. Thinking of music as only being an emotional thing is flat-out a violation of, well, musical and musical instrument fundamentals really.
Seriously, this whole discussion has literally zilch to do with making "soulless" music. The thing you call "soul" is things like dropped notes, and timing variations, being controlled directly by the actions of a musical instrument's human operator. These kind of "errors" being induced by the machine itself, alone, with zero human actions causing them, is most certainly not "soul", it's a bunch of errors in the machine that are fucking non-negotiable. Nearly this entire fucking community is so emotionally-driven with their comments that they don't fucking understand this fundamental concept. Sheesh! It's idiotic, really.
What ever happened to the artistic side of this project? Ever since the self help books and Musk fanboyism started creeping into the MMX vision, the project has strayed farther and farther from the artistic beginnings. Yes, the need for engineering is important in such a project, but the artistic side has been entirely forgotten now, leaving the whole project without much of a soul...
Yup, you nailed it. Musk and the self-help guru worship derailed Martin and his project. The original plywood and wire Marble Machine remains a masterpiece. The MMX flew too close to the sun.
It's kind of fitting that the king of vaporware Elon musk have transformed the MMX into a vaporEar itself.
Tesla truck, cyber truck, hyperloop, every and all the boring company's project (well.. ok they are used to inflate Tesla's sells figures using public money.)
This!! It's so annoying hearing him talk about musk all the time I completely stopped watching
@@WangleLine Yup. I unsubscribed and gave up on Wintergatan. Maybe one day Martin will follow through and make marble music again. Until then, I'm out.
@@WangleLine Also, I am huge fan of your channel!
At some point you might realize that the UA-cam content is the actual product. I mainly want to observe the process, learn from your mistakes, enjoy your creativity, enjoy the music. I don't want it to ever end. It was a long summer, glad to see you again.
I think he does sort of get that, but the YT videos have all been chasing a single goal, a finished and working Marble machine. I do not think he fully understands most of us are not watching or supporting him to see it finished, we watch because of his personality and the process. I feel he has been trying to do himself out of a decent well paying job and the pressure has not encouraged him to finish it, constantly adding complications to delay that day and the machine and videos have suffered, I would suggest the job should now come first, entertaining videos, the machine is just an excuse.
Actually, I am just agreeing with you, but in my own words.
I think what might be missed is that he does not find the current process fulfilling to him. If Martin is not happy doing it, there is no reason to continue
@@spastichobo True, I don't want him to be miserable creating content. I'm actually glad with the conclusion to work towards a music video and take off the pressure for a world tour machine.
He 100% knows that. What I think he needs to do is to change the format from self-reporting to having a documentarian…. Someone ELSE with a camera there on-site to just watch over his shoulder, ask questions every once in a while, generally stay out of his way, yet still capture the progress for the rest of us…. Hanes his editor is 1000 miles away… there needs to be at least one more bat in that stone tower…
You might want to realize it's maybe not a Martin's goal to make UA-cam videos? When we do indeed enjoy watching weekly updates, Martins goal is to make music instead. He got too distracted making fun videos and he acknowledged this issue and is going to fix. Let him do what he wants to do, don't be selfish.
Leave the uncompromising engineering to SpaceX, this is a piece of art. I couldn't care less if it drops a few marbles, but I hate seeing you obsess over perfection and tear yourself down.
I’ve been following the Marble Machine from the distance and this video crushed me 2 months ago when I saw it for the very first time, not because the Machine but because the Creator. I felt something was going wrong from a psychology pov: call it burned, call it demotivation, call it stress, but the worst is that he didnt realize it yet. He is just hidding his real problems behind those 4 points. He is doing shallow efforts but he is reading 3, 4 books about “efficiency”? He is doubting about his efficiency because he thinks he is not matching the expectations, and falling into ineffecient reads to find efficient reasons. He announces he is reducing the number of videos, but he is really trying to hide from the public expectations (cant he really hire someone to record him and produce the videos while he just focus on creating the machine?). The business of those book’s authors is to create a fear so they can fix it with some guru words. Due to his current, at my sight, fragile mindset he is falling into their trap.
Is it because he has been too alone during these years in that French house? Or because he was used to be alone, rat lab, and the enforced socializing is killing him without him noticing? Or a mix of both?
I’m currently afraid as how he is managing his frustrations, his exposure, his expected expectatives, because if he doesnt find a good balance, things will go way south...
Wow your right !! I though he finished hes machine,!! So sad!!
My circumstances exactly, and same reaction too.
Martin, you could work on this for another 20 years and it wouldn't be perfect. Perfection is the enemy of finished. You have built an amazing machine that is entertaining as hell to watch you build and play, who cares if it drops a few marbles. It never was a practical instrument to tour with, too big, too heavy, won't fit as carry on luggage :-) The programing plates are not suited for quick change over in a live concert situation. It's an amazing piece of engineering and ART. What musician does a concert and never hits a wrong note? Why expect it from a musical art sculpture? I have really enjoyed your journey of problem solving and seeing your progress as a fabricator. Just remember the original plan was to PLAY MUSIC!. Get your band together, make some music, share some videos . That's what we're all waiting for, the joy of your crazy, incredible, amazing marble art machine making the wonderful Wintergatan music. I for one am sorry to see you go down a rabbit hole of perfection. I wish you the best, it's been a fun ride.
You obviously do not understand "perfectionism" fully. I'm not surprised though. Nearly this entire fucking community makes the same bullshit argument.
There are 2 types of imperfection you need to understand:
1. Imperfection as a desirable element in live, human-controlled performance.
2. Imperfection as a flaw in a mechanical system that must be fixed (yes, this does indeed apply to musical instruments... do not attempt to argue otherwise!).
Please, do not confuse the 2.
I can confidently say that this has absolutely zilch to do with making the music soulless in any way. That's not because Martin has explicitly said so. That's because it's obvious from his actions and his methods of working on this project.
Martin, if you remove all of the dumb requirements, you'll be left with a xylophone and a mallet.
It breaks my heart that you think these last 3 years have been a mistake or a failure. You've created an incredible work of art and engineering. I started watching this channel BECAUSE you decided to go with a magnet lift despite everyone else telling you not to, despite the additional challenges it provided. Watching you solve each challenge as it arose, and create this insane machine has been so much fun. I'm scared of how boring and ugly the MMX-T will be if you remove all of the "bad" design choices from the MMX. I don't think the goal is the play music, it's to play music in a beautiful way that no one ever has before. Maybe you and your audience just have different ideas of where the finish line is.
I was thinking the same thing. If he was playing the same tunes with regular instruments, probably no one would care.
He doesn't think it was a failure. He as much as said "it's almost perfect". He also said that the real takeaway from the entire thing was the learning. That "The machine that builds the machine" can sometimes be more important than the product.
This is all an admission of quality and fallability, NOT a belief that it was a mistake and a failure. Learn and iterate. That's what he's doing.
Yeah, he should rewatch his own videos, starting from the video #1.
Y'all... The machine that builds the machine. The last three years aren't a mistake or failure, they are a building block in completing the final puzzle -- building a Marble Machine that *can* play tight music and be carried on a world tour.
The goal of the project is to have a functioning marble machine that can play music, so no, he won't end up with a xylophone and mallet, because that's not what he's trying to make.
As hundreds of people in the comments noticed I think you missed the main point why we enjoyed your videos so much. The beauty of the MMX is in its dumbness, artistic imperfections and overcomplex design. We never thought about it in terms of the engineering projects. All of the remarks like quotes from Elon Musk, motivational books and some crypto mambo jambo are a bit too much for me. I love this community and the idea of MMX but I think your perspective no longer matches mine - as the viewer and supporter.
agreed.
Agreed
Well of course but this is a biased sample pool. Personally I've been a fan since the days of dektektivbyrån. I'm a fan of the music and these videos always come second and I'm not the only one.
This whole thing is making me sad.
Martin has practically forgot that the MMX was never made to be perfect. It never will be perfect.
If you hold on to this perfectionist and crypto bro mindset, MMX will never be finished.
The MMX itself is a dumb design requirement. Tell me a gigantic machine that plays music with marbles isn't dumb design.
Please don't keep holding on to this mindset.
Why are you telling the man who made the first project what the purpose of the first project was?
@@xristosdomini7249 Because he genuinely forgot the purpose.
@@kantraa -- the purpose of the MMX was to build a reliable machine that could go on a world tour and play live. If the machine can't function reliably, it can't go on the world tour and play live on stage. This one started failing due to the volume of marbles with 8 channels -- imagine what happens with 32.
I think Martin knows the purpose of his invention more than you do.
Whatever Martin decides to do next, I'll respect his choice.
BUT, I really wish he wouldn't take every advice from crypto bros/ multi-billionaires / self-help Guru blindly like they were some fundamental truths. Sure, some of their messages can make sense or be motivational, but can also be very dangerous and drive him off his original path.
And most Importantly they're NOT on the same journey as Martin.
For these guys, the top priority always boils down to profit while Martin's core priority has always been to try and create the greatest art possible.
Martin, if you see this, please take care of yourself and follow YOUR heart!
Sometimes I feel like a person needs to seek their validation internally not externally. Don't worry about the Jeff Bazos of this world and focus on your own stuff
Are you a fool? "Crypto bro/ multi billionaire" had spent his entire career as an engineer in the most difficult engineering field
Shooting the messenger instead of considering the core of the message? Don't let your biases blind you to wisdom
@@citricdemon that crypto bro/multi millionaire isn’t even an engineer - and he has not spent his entire career in that field.
@@citricdemon Lives depend on rockets working properly. Art is just a pastime. Apples and oranges.
Your username seems weirdly appropriate in that regard. 😜
As a senior developer I recognize a lot anti pattern and mistakes you are doing. And now you are doing one many developers who are going from junior to more skilled are doing. You are in a refactor-loop, instead of going for completion you trying to make a perfect system. You have enough skillset to see and fix most problems which means endless of redesigns and "optimization". Why do you think there are millions of uncompleted indie games or failed startups. Most of them failed for this reason. The real skill is to know when it's time to say; this is good enough or to pull the break.
And Musk is certainly not the Messiah of engineering
It starts with "no part."
It ends with "no art."
The design challenges you've overcome were all in service to form. Increase the resilience, make a marble catcher/reservoir, and make an album not one song! Don't treat it like something you're about to throw away. There can't be a touring version if you throw away the real thing. The fully-reproducible version can be built by other people while you're switching to making music. Don't scrap your art because it isn't a rocket. It's not supposed to be a rocket! If it weren't form first, it would not exist. Don't go down Elon's path; it leads to a world where the Marble Machine doesn't exist. Instead, make your own path! You're doing great! This latest hiccup isn't a big deal, you'll solve it easily. But if you fundamentally chase function over form, you will definitely end up with a very efficient machine, but all the magic will be gone. It won't be worth it. Art must be in the driver's seat, or you'll end up frustrated, full of soulless despair, and not realize why. You'll have to come back to this exact spot and NOT turn this way. Please rethink, look back to where this all came from, and you'll see: a midi-player would never have sparked this much joy.
The project fell into the "premature optimisation" rabbit hole a while ago.
@Rob King exactly, I'm no engineer but isn't optimisation supposed to happen AFTER you've finished the thing?
Please don't use the term anti-pattern. You sound like a sheep.
I think part of the problem is there are a bunch of engineers in this community yelling at an artist, telling him to stop making art and simply build a well-engineered machine instead. The engineers' arguments are compelling because their suggestions are efficient and backed by a wealth of knowledge and experience. When engineers build rockets, they strive to maximize efficiency. Rockets have a singular function - to provide thrust. The MMX isn’t just some machine created to achieve a singular function. There are myriad far simpler means of producing music than a marble machine. Leonardo da Vinci was an artist at heart who enjoyed conceptualizing fantastic machines and novel theories, many of which were beyond what could be engineered at the time. Leonardo's "Mona Lisa" took 4 years to paint and, some sources say, another 10 years to perfect. His attention was often divided between several different concurrent projects, some of which he just left unfinished so he could start something else. Leonardo da Vinci was famously inefficient. Today; however, he is more famous for the masterpieces only he could produce. A midi keyboard plugged into a computer does not a masterpiece make, but together they can produce music as the marble machine does. Engineers are practical. They would generally agree that a marble machine isn't an efficient means of producing music altogether. Artists are dreamers. They find novel ways to challenge the impossible and create works that are somehow greater than the sum of their parts. It is the gestalt of the MMX that makes it a masterpiece. That’s why it wasn’t an engineer who created the original Marble Machine. It was you, Martin, the artist.
I completely agree. In rocketry, there's a singular objective, and anything not serving that objective must deleted. To a rocket scientist, "good engineering" means aggressively trimming the fat (sometimes literally, as weight matter so much on a rocket) and throwing aesthetics out the window in favor of function. But as a result, rockets often look very boring. They're all just tall round tubes full of boomy stuff. (I think it's the concept of space travel that makes rockets exciting, more so than the vehicles themselves.) Whereas the MMX doesn't need to be hyper-efficient and optimize every detail. As long as it can keep a steady tempo and play the music without losing an unreasonable amount of marbles, it's good enough. If it can do all this while looking visually interesting, all the better.
Also, fallen marbles are inevitable. I still think there should be some kind of mesh net or catch-basin at the bottom of the machine, to contain any lost marbles and prevent them from rolling away.
@@TheCakeMixer There are many architects who focus purely on pushing the boundaries of what’s possible. They iterate on design in order to _make_ their vision possible. “Art-chitects” use their knowledge of structural mechanics in cleaver ways to enable their intended form to be functional.
But if it is not a 100% working music instruments it will be only seen as a sound sculpture. Martin's goal was a music instrument first AFAIK. Cool looking sure... But still a real 100% working music instrument. Multiple time I thought he was riding unnecessary complicated mountain roads with a tired car instead of paying a fee to go thru the tunnel. If he had done a fully working MMX V1 he could have then rework the design to make it a masterpiece on a V2. Because the V0 was not even fully working. Having done the other way the road to XT will be heartbreaking each and every minutes for him. Scrap magnet ? Scrap pipes ? Scrap wheels ? Scrap kinetic fingers ? Scrap ball flower like traps ? Etc. At one point he will have to focus on what he really really wants. I think he is also way too much reading books about what to do in life when he could simply write on a paper his priorities in life by order and stick to that. Is it to make a music instrument ? Design sound sculpture ? Go on a world tour ? Etc And which order ?
I feel like no one in the comments have ever engineered anything in their life. A lot of times, fixing a problem will cause three other problems. Fixing one of the three problems will produce three more problems. The engineer gets trapped in an endless loop of problems causing more problems. The only way to solve it is to not cause the original problem in the first place. Which is why he wants to simply redesign the whole thing again. He's simply spent too much time in the loop and wants out. You guys simply do not understand what it's like to be trapped in that loop. People like to dream about the day they solve every single problem, but it simply isn't realistic. Engineers aren't stupid, they have their reasons.The loop really is a nightmare.
@@chen-yumau1913 well said! I think lots of people here just want a beautiful soap-opera of artist-engineer conflict. They don’t understand he’s not primarily a kinetic sculpture artist or actor, he’s a MUSICIAN who 3 years on still doesn’t have a reliable musical instrument he can go on tour with and has learned a lot of engineering truths on the way. I don’t think he’s less interested in the aesthetic, he’s just more realistic with the engineering process. And as for the inverted snobbery about Elon Musk poisoning the project or being one thing or another - pff, there really isn’t enough challenge and scrutiny about the primitive tribal nonsense which surrounds celebrity - is it possible that there are some really good and some not so good ideas which come from the same person? Could there be some immensely useful engineering insights as well as some daft nonsense? No, people just prefer to either love or hate - they think something is beautiful or not… is holding complexity and nuance (and putting themselves in the shoes of others) just too much like hard work and too humble for social media consumers these days?
I don't see anything dumb in the design. Certainly, some parts of the lift mechanism are a bit Rube Goldbergish, but they add to the beauty and awesomeness of the machine. An art teacher once told me, "Don't try to make it perfect. You'll ruin it."
A story of how an artist can lose his creativity, something that I didn't think was possible... but I guess that with an infinite amount of time, every option stops being a possibility.
I think you're making a mistake. This machine is a work of art, and should be showcased as such. Those planetary gears are a beautiful centrepiece that represent what I think is a special aspect of the machine - how it elicits wonder and intrigue. I think you and those who have collaborated with you have proved that you can find design solutions that serve both function and form very well. It may not function absolutely perfectly, but I really don't think most of your audience expects it to. I think perfectionism has often been one thing that has held you back from finishing the project. Thank you for all the effort you've gone to to include us in the journey - look forward to more in the future, whatever it may be :)
It's not about perfection it's about consistent stress-free operation. Taking a bespoke lemon machine on tour that you're constantly worried about failing upon disassembly/reassembly and having to make duck tape patches and angled-tongue love tap adjustments just to barely perform last minute would be an absolute nightmare for any sane artist.
EXACTLY the answer I was looking for. The machine is beautiful and it needs to be looked at as art. That's the whole point. If you would want to make it functioning, you might not use marbles at all. But the fact that it works with marbles and these special planetary gears is amazing!
The hard part is that you are an artist not an engineer. The great thing is that you are an artist, not an engineer. There is always a more efficient more robust way to do it, but it will loose the artistic, crazy cool feel to it. I am a hardware engineer and I have enjoyed watching you grow technically, but it has hurt seeing you loose some of the enthusiastic, artistic spark. If we wanted the most worry free music machine, it wouldn't use marbles...
@@newtonbomb Yeah that's a good point, would be quite stressful not to have confidence in it in that scenario. Perhaps I'm too optimistic to hope that he and the team could get to a place where they're confident enough in its ability. But I would so love to see it on the stage, or at least showcased in a few different songs and videos!
Nice name btw ;)
@@Alakay77 I think I'm middle way between you and Alex Moyer. Of course the machine needs to function, it's not questionable. But the reason I'm supporting this project it's not "having a piece of engineering perfection". It's because I believe the world NEEDS to have people like Martin giving all they have just to craft something BEAUTIFUL. I believe this is why we remember artists, musicians, painters from ancient times. If I need to see something FUNCTIONING I just disassemble an old clock. But I can't imagine something like MMX by myself, I need people like Martin to amaze me. Maybe this way I will be, in my own life, able to produce something else just for the sake of its beauty.
You talked a lot about how you used to put "form over function" and I agree that MMX has to work (and therefore the functionality has to be reliable). BUT I think that, unlike rockets, the form and beauty of the machine is really important. Even though I'm currently studying engineering, I don't think I'd be following this series if it was all about "perfect functional design" (whatever that means - if it means anything). I like your crazy ideas: the magnet and the wheels that bring the marble back to the top, the funnels (even if it creates problems).....
In a way, I think that beauty and form are also functionalities here.
However, I am not trying to say that you should forget the technical part and let each piece be beautiful but not functional. I think that a MM should have the technical requirements to go on tour and play live music (which is profoundly difficult). So I'm not opposed in principle to a new MM that is enriched with everything you've learned in the process of building the MMX. But I really think that to make this new MM bigger than MMX, it will not be enough to make it "just" more functional than MMX.
Therefore, I think that when needed, you should only care about a reliable way to do a function (when it's critical). But at the same time try to keep the beauty and the art of the MMX.
Kindly,
An usual commentator
Great comment. It's totally not quite a balancing act. Spend 95% of the time-effort-resources-energy on building something that executes as intended and then the spare 5% on customizing & modifying it for the occasion.
There is no rational/functional reason to build a complex mechanical machine to do something than can be solved using any number of software or electronics.
Building the machine it is an expression of art in itself, and should in my perspective be viewed as such, a piece of art. And in art, folly is the norm.
Martin, the community you assembled was comforting during these last few years. It helped me through some extremely rough periods.
The one thing I’ve learned from you is to be playful while creating. I come back to this channel hoping to see something new and then realize, it’s time to contribute instead of consuming. Thanks for all the laughs and melodies. Hopefully I can grow beyond my fears and perfectionism to give to others as much as you have.
Checked my poster on my wall today.. it showed a big machine saying 'I believe'
I still believe
I've been a supporter on UA-cam for 2 years, and have loved watching this process. I have seen nothing but constant progress, constant learning, and constant improvement. Sometimes the progress was monumental, and sometimes it was small, but it was always progress. I have never once felt like these videos were pointless. I've felt the joy when you succeed in a good design, or whacked another mole, and I've felt the pain when things have failed, and I've loved it. I feel like I've grown to know you, like you're a friend even though we've never really met. I've enjoyed watching as you get distracted at times and don't make much progress, or when you pursue an idea only to see it fall apart, or when you push through and finally figure out that one thing that's been bothering you, or take the time to make some music that always makes me smile! It's been inspiring to see so many of my own flaws and bad habits in you, and yet see that despite those, you are able to accomplish amazing things that seem almost impossible! It gives me the hope that despite my own shortcomings, I too can make beautiful things that lift and inspire others!
So many of us are here, and were here, and will still be here, because we want to believe in you and your music. We've seen you create beauty from bland pieces of plywood over and over. We've seen you create masterpieces, both visual and auditory, from scrap wood and metal! We're not here to be your project managers, or to pressure you, or to yell at you for "not getting enough done", or "not working hard enough". Those people can fall by the wayside! We're the ones asking you to take care of yourself, to pace yourself, to slow down and make sure that you're staying healthy and not burning yourself out. We're here to support you in sharing with us things that you love to do, and the things that you learn in the process, and to be inspired by it, and hopefully to be able to be a part of it!
I hope that you're able to read this. Watching this video, it seems you feel like you've let us down in some way over the years. That could never be farther from the truth for me, and for those of us who care more about you than about getting something out of this. You have been a constant source of inspiration to us all, and I thank you for that, for every video, for every song, and for every moment. I hope that you don't give up on the beauty that you hope to achieve with this machine and the MMX-T. As an engineer, I understand the desire to create the perfect, most efficient, and most flawless machine, but I hope that you recognize that often the flaws are what makes something beautiful. I’ve never felt like the focus on the design was a mistake, but rather, something that made the MMX great, made it beautiful, and what drew so many people to it. I also think that without that focus, you would never have had the engineering challenges that led you to learn and grow so much, and that inspired us all.
Remember that we loved your original marble machine despite the many marbles on the floor.
I could not agree more with Tanner!
Do not be hard on yourself, Martin. Music is art, not science. Building an art installation to make music is twice the joy, not twice scientific perfection. Please finish the MMX, and make music with it, World Tour or not. MMX-T can wait. 😉
Exactly, FFF gives me an iPod. I want to see art and marbles flying everywhere!
I completely agree all what you say , tanner
Martin , keep going as you are , who you are , and let's dream with that piece of art
E Musk is not at all an artist , You are , nothing to compare , no need to compete
Thank for all you have done and shown to all of us , Keep going , and keep safe
This. This comment needs to be seen. Tanner couldn't have said it better!
The Lord of the Rings was all about the journey not the final moment of destroying the ring.
I'm glad to see you're back, but don't lose sight of the fact that you're building an over-sized music box, not a falcon heavy. The ideas of silicon valley tech bro's don't necessarily apply here. If you ignore the art and focus only on the function, the marble machine risks becoming a lifeless, uninspiring box.
That being said, I'm excited to see where the project goes from here. Your videos are always inspiring!
I agree.. the falcon heavy is so much less complicated....
If "the best part is no part," then the MMX shouldn't exist at all. Working rockets are satisfying because they work. That doesn't make them art. A better midi-player is still just a midi-player. He's wrong to put "form and maybe function" as the other path. It's very simple: not form from function, function from form.
Engineering over Art: Form from Function
Art over Engineering: Function from Form
@@KalonOrdona2 Espeically when everyone has an excellent music reproduction device in their pocket.
yeah I hope it doesnt get simplified so much that its just a regular band of people playing music... if you focus on practicality, this machine and project dont exist. I liked a comment by another person who basically said that they saw the MMX as a Rube Goldberg machine which does complicated things to do the "simple" task of playing music. thats the goal. It looks fun and plays music. but its not 100% accurate like playing drums with a computer would be. If we got realistic and said that the goal is to play music sometimes, then we already have it!! He could take back up parts around the tour just incase something breaks
MMX probably won't explode.
If someone had told me a couple years ago that this project would end at 98% completion with Martin becoming a self-help book addicted crypto cultist, I would've laughed at them... What a joke.
But has it ended? Only the artist will decide. He owes us nothing.
@@AdelaeR from martin on his discord
Third time the charm!!!
MMX-T will be different for everyone involved because of one crucial difference: The CAD model for MMX-T will be THE machine. In the MMX project, we have been bogged down by having two mirrored ghosts of the same design, the physical machine in my studio and the digital CAD model in the metaverse.
For MMX-T, there will be only one version, THE version. Whatever tiny design decision is made in CAD will affect the machine that stands on the world tour stage. We can go back to first principles, and we will have the chance to incorporate all the great ideas coming up from the community. The machine will be designed to avoid manual processes and designed for particulars manufacturers. It will be manufactured and assembled by professionals only, not by me. It will be so much more fun, productive, and exciting.
I plan to write down the less dumb design requirements for the MMX-T and create some kind of "white paper" for the machine and process. Just like the DAO project, this is another project that I don't want to launch before it's ready.
The pain from failing with the MMX in public has been immense, the lessons hard-earned. I won't underestimate the evil mole federation again.
Community Meetings and the discord server
For now, I am pausing my online presence to do deep work on other projects. I am looking forward to getting in touch with discord and the internet again once any community-related projects are ready to be discussed.
All the very best,
Martin
@@zport1853 thanks for update!
@@zport1853 oh gosh. He's gone full crypto bro. Disappointing. Sad that he feels like he failed when most of the community was fine with a machine that worked 99.99% of the time which he has. World tour always seemed ambitious. I started worrying last year that he was going to go down the optimization rabbit hole and lose his original vision.
@@davidchidester5463 you see this in business when executives become convinced that only if they had the *perfect* plan everything else would be great. They lose any perspective on execution. I love Martin and this project is so inspiring. But part of the inspiration was that this was a contraption made by a wizard with a community obsession. I don't see what was wrong with that! It was so beautiful. Nobody cared if it worked or not - why does Martin care so much that he closed everything down without finishing... And he plans to outsource production to "experts"
There's a quote which applies here very nicely: "Don't let the perfect get in the way of the good." Perfectionism kills. You have a miracle of engineering here, and you should be proud of it. Think of all the work that went into designing and building this. Think of all the work other people have done to help you. Think of all the support you've gotten from your fans. To throw this machine away because it isn't 100% perfect is nothing less than a complete waste, and it almost borders on being selfish IMO. None of these machines will ever be perfect. That is simply how life is. Perfection is impossible, but we don't care. Look how successful your first one was! The MMX Is LEAGUES ahead of it, and you're not even trying anymore because of one or two minor issues? Disappointing to say the least.
I've always thought of the Marble Machine as a Rube Goldberg machine of sorts. It completes it's task of making music, and it may not be a perfectly efficient and streamlined process, but the process is beautiful. If you wanted the process to be perfect, delete the form for function and just make all your music on the computer. I mean you're trying to play a vibraphone with marbles. Lets be real, that's not the most efficient design, but it's pretty. You can strive for perfection in an imperfect process. That's not insanity, that's life honestly. And I think that's beautiful. And honestly finding interesting solutions for these functions to look interesting is the most interesting part of the videos. I hope this funk doesn't grab you for too long. And I can't wait to see what you make in the future.
I posted a similar comment. In a lot of senses, the most ‘efficient’ marble machine is an MP3 player…
@@oldvlognewtricks Or a guy with a rapid fire BB gun shooting at a xylophone. Imma try that.
The problem is that we aren't identifying the true function of the machine. It is not to play music, but to inspire people. How do you engineer inspiration? The most rational answer would be to copy a design that has already achieved that goal: the OG Marble Machine. Just get that, and make it work properly. If a few marbles drop then so be it. Hire a marble picker-upper.
if you wanted it to be perfect just watch pipe dream by animusic but the beauty of it comes from it being real
Completely agree. No one would watch this channel if it was just about the most efficient or reliable way of making music. The marble machine makes no sense, but it is not something that shouldn’t exist. It is something that should continually be improved. Be made more complex/interesting AND more reliable.
Don't forget that the primary purpose of the marble machine is actually looks. If it was making music, then you would just do it electronically, with much better results.
Martin has lost the plot. The content that came from this channel and the MMX used to be some of the greatest on UA-cam. Now suddenly all of it is "dumb" and "non-essential"? The perfect marble machine isn't going to happen unless you seriously water down the beautiful artistic aspects that made the MMX so special to begin with. If that's what it takes, then what's the point? You'll have a soulless husk of what was previously a wonderful and inspiring piece of art. It's been fun, but this isn't a direction that I'm going to follow. Farewell and good luck to your future endeavors, Martin.
Honestly, I think I finally understand what it means to sell your soul for something. Martin wanted so desperately to make the perfect machine that he gave up the dreams that made it worth building. This channel, his Discord, all of his followers, patrons, and adoring fans, everything he has built laid to waste like the bad end of a cruel genie's wish. He might get his perfect machine, but I'm certain he'll live to regret it.
Its not about making it "perfect" or "flawless", its about making it usable, for multiple concerts without having to essentially take apart and rebuild the entire thing between concerts. Hes not making art here, hes building an instrument, so usability and functionality is as important here as the easthetic
@@NitroNinja324 so dramatic lol
@@JulianGrayMedia I'm upset, bruh.
@@slavicandroid1999 instruments are half of the art of music art
Finish it. Have you heard Elon Musks music? Me neither.
He brought out a couple songs. Definitely not the kind I would want to remember
This IS the ‘world tour’. This you tube series is reaching more eyes, hearts and minds than any literal world tour might.
What was your original goal? To make music. You have been making music. And videos. And entertainment.
Amazing work that so many hang out for.
Keep making music in whatever state the machine is in.
Repair it and improve it, and make more music.
The difference between a rocket, car, or boring machine and the marble machine X is the device's primary function. The rocket, car, or earth moving machine are utilitarian; they don't have to be pretty, they just have to function. The marble machine's primary function is to entertain; it has to function, and look interesting doing it. So, if you take out unnecessary elements, it will work, but you might as well have a non descript box that plays music.
If he takes or the "pretty" parts and just makes it funktion first then he can MAKE it pretty when he has a working machine
There's obviously some sort of balance to find here. You want to take out just enough of the cool looking yet functionally stupid and unneccessary features to get it working reliably enough to do what it needs to do, but not more.
Yes, you're right : Marble Machine X isn't supposed to just be a machine; it's a piece of art. An Martin is not an engineer, he is an artist
Elon and his consequences have been a disaster for the Marble Machine X.
Still we can all agree that the machine should work. Right? 👍
Honestly my take on this has become so sad. I don't think most of us ever saw the project as being a failure over the past few years. If anything, watching iterations and changes get made was what was exciting. Even if the machine was only ever constantly being upgraded, that is what so many of us have been here for from the beginning. It wasn't always about the finish line but the journey. The journey has been amazing, and I just hope you can see it in a light that represents all the joy us viewers feel when watching each and every build video.
Pleeeeease create an album with the MMX. You can't just toss that beauty away like that!
Ngl gonna be a huge let down to see mmx basically get scrapped for a simple marble music box. I would rather see the mmx perform at its current state then see a music box that always works and makes the ballerina dance when the lid opens.
This DAO idea looks like more of an unnecessary solution-in-search-of-a-problem than any of the unreliable-but-cool mechanisms on the MMX.
Martin pointed out, that this happening after everything else like a COO is fixed
Agreed. What is there for people to vote on from outside the engineering team? If all contributors are suddenly supposed to have a say in what he does, that again requires him to produce a lot of info material (videos) just for that purpose alone.
A DAO is not the solution to running a project centered around a single person or small team.
Came here to make that remark.
Just like the COO job description is the opposite of the “essentialism” and “dumb design requirements” pinpointed before.
Yes, hiring someone to manage people and production is a great idea. But what this person should do is to shorten the time between idea and realisation.
Martin’s core added value is design, problem solving, communication and making music. What Martin needs was never called a COO, it was simply called a (personal) assistant. His/her job would simply be to be there, to get everything else done as fast, effortless and invisible as possible. Make sure every solution to every problem arrives as much machined and assembled and ready to be added as possible in a minimum of time. Make sure Martin has nothing to set up and nothing to organise. A half-a-word-and-it’s-already-done kind of guy or girl. Or two, if necessary.
It’s the trick which makes it possible for movies to get made, fashion designers to get collections out in time, for architects to get buildings built and for big artist studios to have large scale output - if you want references close to you.
Because Martin needs less multitasking, every hour of this person will save more than an hour of Martin’s time.
And in a year or two, this person will be able to do more and more of the stuff only Martin is able to do for now.
Before playing startup, trying to become SpaceX, just try being Studio Wintergatan.
@@marcolammers Agreed, an assistant is the answer. The worst thing that can happen is that Marten hires some grifter who claims to be an expert in DAOs.
@@jaapvaneeden6589 If it is made a responsibility of the COO/assistant, then it is more likely to happen regardless of whether it is sensible.
The point you made about the mistake of giving looks too much importance is a problem most architecture has.
Never forget this golden design principle: Form = Function.
Bruh I would have never imagined this guy being a fan of Elon Musk…
I dont think him referencing something he said necessarily makes him a fan
@LordTerias I think it's pretty clear that he is fanboying to Moon and back
4:42 you're building a convergence between a kinetic sculpture and a working musical instrument. If you hadn't prioritized aesthetics to the level you've done so far, the project wouldn't have nearly as much traction and wouldn't attract as many fans and collaborators.
This video makes me sad. I have followed this project since the beginning, and have enjoyed every step of this journey. When you say that making videos is non-essential, it feels like you're saying that what I have enjoyed so much these last few years is unimportant.
I absolutely understand that priorities need to shift, but I want you to understand that what Wintergatan means to me is not whether or not a machine gets finished. The videos are what I loved first. I think I watched almost a year before I listened to the music - I now love that music.
You made two mistakes, 1 taking advice for use with rockets and applying it to art. 2 self help books.
My friend, we are already blown away by your mechanism as it is. You don't need to make it appear more than it is. We enjoy seeing your creations as they are.
Martin, maybe be it’s time to consider hiring a videographer so you don’t have to worry about making a video every week. Honestly the people who support you would be happy watching you eat noodles. You support is 50% for the marble machine and 50% purely because you are such an awesome human being. Let someone take over the small videos just so we can get a glimpse every now and then and you can still control/make the big videos that are more important to you.
I thought Hannes was Martin videographer
I very much agree
He clearly wants to be alone in his creative space. Having a videographer is the complete opposite
does he have a wife?
I am downright scared of you hiring a COO. The last thing you want is to lose your independence, creativity, and ownership. I can't help but think of other artists/youtube influencers who handed over the reins to someone else and they were fleeced or taken for a ride.
You got this. You are learning. The videos are amazing. Just don't swing the pendulum to far the other way.
Guitar strings break, violin bows fray, drum sticks snap, marbles fall.
Music is art. Art is imperfection.
Get your head out of the business handbooks and just create.
Nobody but you is here for perfection. We're here for creativity, like the MM. Remember, we subscribed to watch you build the successor to the shambles, not a perfect exhibition piece.
There are no dumb designs dude, you’re doing great, it’s hard but you it’ll get better and you’ll be just fine, you’ll get through it. We all believe in you.
Hello Martin, I just got to the part of the video where you write off the past 3 years of work as shallow, I think you are being hyper critical of yourself here. just want to say that there is nothing easy about making loads of high quality videos, building a following and sharing a massive amount of yourself with the universe \ internet! love all your content and know that when you get the final version of the machine finished it will look amazing, sound amazing and bring joy to everyone who sees you perform! Thank you.
What the heck were his parents telling him all summer? Obviously not anything helpful.
Make the requirements less dumb?? Can I remind you that the initial requirement is "play music instruments by throwing marbles on them"? Martin, ooh dear Martin, you definitely need to have someone with a fresh look on the marble machine project, but I don't think MMX-T would be the solution, au contraire, it would be a new problem. Yet you're so close with the MMX, and I really understand how you're getting tired of fixing weird things that are maybe too precise, but I don't really see, if you remove those dumb requirements, how the machine would be a piece of art, both from a musician and an engineer point of view.
I think the only dumb requirement is to do a world tour with it.
there are a ton of channels that still are left to be added, which will put a ton of strain on the already failing transportation system. if he really wants to tour with a machine like this, it must be dead simple and reliable. it will still be insanely cool to have a machine playing music with marbles despite it not having a magnetic transportation system, for instance.
@@vemundkremund3221 If it is simple then it's entire reason for being has been voided... It is supposed to be a spectacle.
In its simplest form that could just be a bank of motors moving marbles and a bank of electronic synth pickups translating the impacts into the desired sounds, that would not however have any wow factor, it would no longer be a spectacle and therefore fails in its primary reason for being.
Art is not about perfection. Art is about communicating an idea, an emotion, a dream. Engineering can help in that endeavor but it should not lead. The beauty of the Marble Machine was its baroqueness not its brokeness. Yes there can be beauty in engineering. And if that is where your passion lies then by all means pursue it. But if you have dreams and ideas you want to convey that are not constrained by engineering then find a way to make them reality.
I wouldn't take inspiration from Elon musk of all people. He has made enough stupid projects and poor decisions that wasted millions of dollars at this point.
His engineers are the one to praise, and i doubt its as simple.
Personally, I don’t think you should take Elon Musks lesson to heart. Elon has to focus on function over looks since he’s literally making sure the space ships don’t blow up cargo or passengers during a trip to space where it’s a danger zone for everyone. So, with him it’s efficiency and safety that are his major concerns.
For you though, it’s completely different. You’re making a musical instrument. It should be aesthetically pleasing and invoke wonder and awe while it plays with marbles. Would it have some malfunctions? Yea, but that’s ok since it still carries a big audience that like the use of marbles and music. Functionality it good, but form is absolutely essential for creating artistic expression.
Also Elon runs a big business and a big business will happily sell you a subpar product if the savings will be greater than the costs generated by lawsuits or bad PR.
Seriously this. The natural end of this sort of thinking is a studio album, played by a group of musicians with the ability to play multiple takes until it's 100% right. Now everyone around the world hears the band in perfect engineered glory.
If Musk were to follow his own advice, he’d see the Hyperloop requirements would need to be much less dumb and switch to building conventional trains. Hyperloop is an over-engineered solution to a nonexistent problem and badly suffers from the “putting the marbles on a single lane” sort of issue: it just doesn’t have the required capacity.
I agree, Elon Musk has taken that principle WAY too far, to the point where he's selling a one-size-fits-nobody-really luxury car. It's only the hype that keeps Tesla going. Once that wears off and the other manufacturers catch up, they are in for a rude awakening.
@@synchronos1 Except trains don't go to that speed ... so what's your point
If you want to abandon the artistic flair of the machine, don't use marbles. Just make music on a laptop. Done.
The joy of this machine is that it's utterly pointless, and serves no musical purpose that couldn't be achieved far more easily on any old music software. But we aren't here to see a black box play music. We're here to see this beautifully archaic machine trundle it's way to magnificence. To see it gradually rise from the ethereal into reality. Seeing it function is an education. It's an art installation that happens to make music, and the journey has always been far more satisfying than the goal.
This might be an unpopular opinion. But simply presenting a finished, perfectly functioning marble machine that forgoes beauty, in a few months or years, without everyone watching it grow - feels like a betrayal of everything that made this special.
Unfortunately this video has doused my fire. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for the amazing ride thus far. I wish you all the best, and sincerely hope you succeed in your new goals, even if I don't agree with them. Keep being awesome.
I think he still has to keep using this machine, but only for making music video's. Not only one song, but whole albums. When there is an mistake he can just record again. There is no need for further improvements. this is much more fun to watch. The machine X - T will the machine for touring. He can make use of the same programming and copying some of the mechanics so he doesn't have to redesign the programming. Some main parts that has a good fucntionally, like the marble drop system and the big wheel with notes.Just copying those parts. He can just replace the programming plates into the machine X - T. The same size. Modulair.
To be fair, it sounds like you've misunderstood the design requirements of this machine. It is supposed to be:
1. A machine that plays music using marbles
2. A beautiful art piece
3. Consistent enough for a world tour
Martin is really serious about completing this project and up until recently he's only been focused on points one and two. But point three is just as important to him, and he's not going to give up until he builds something that meets all three requirements. When he simplifies certain impractical aspects of the machine, it's not necessarily becoming less beautiful or artistic. That will still be a priority no matter what. Who's to say that the magnet lift, for example, is the most beautiful solution possible? There could be another marble lift type that is equally beautiful but works consistently enough to take on a world tour.
I guarantee that whatever he ends up creating will be beautiful, even if it works.
You have said this better than I ever could have. I am also feeling pretty deflated.
Watching the stumbles and triumphs along the way to artistic and engineering brilliance MADE this project.
@@sonofzingo7 But that's not what people have put their money towards. They saw the machine and they paid to help get the machine going. Simply switching out the machine for the live shows in which people will be able to view the machine they paid for is a bit of a disservice, no? It's like paying to support a filmmaker create this awesome and ambitious artistic movie and then going to the theater and the movie is swapped for a Marvel movie. Sure, it looks great and performs reliably, but it's not what you put your money towards
I miss your videos Martin. I love your ‘dumb’ design. It’s awesome.
It's not a machine that should work perfectly without failure, it's a piece of art! Please don't give up on MMX, we want to see it alive and playing music.
When I shared your videos about the Marble Machine X with friends all those those years ago, some didn't get it. Why make something so complicated when you could just play the instruments, or have a computer do it. With their logic, the very premise of the machine was dumb design. It saddens me a little after supporting all these years that the one we see live will be stripped back.
As much as I agree that some forms are too impractical to ever be reliable, I have always thought that the beauty of the Marble Machine X was not that it was the most sensible way to automate the playing of music but that it was a challenge and a great example of why I love humans sometimes, because sometimes we do things just to prove we can do them.
All this is to say, I hope the MMX-T still retains some of it's whimsical nature.
I wouldn't worry, being functional doesn't have to detract form its artistic merit. Consider every great cathedral or some of the amazing skyscrapers that have been built these days. They're gorgeous buildings that have also been rigorously engineered. Form and Function are not mutually exclusive.
This is a good response though- the friends are right, but the way in which they are right supports the idea. The point of the machine isn't just to play music. We have machines for that. If that was the purpose, they're completely correct in their judgement.
MMX is a work of art, and we are watching the creative process. The complexity of the machine adds to the wonder.
@@zarblitz Yea cathedrals which cost a lot to maintain and they get maintained because they mean something, not because they are "functional".
I think the danger is even greater. Function first is an existential threat to the Marble Machine, because its very existence is impractical, its very existence depends on form first, in the same way a sculpture is. If you applied "the best part is no part" to a sculpture, you'd get a lump of material. If you applied "the best part is no part" to a rube goldberg machine, you'd get a slide, if you got anything at all. "Form and maybe function" is a misidentification of the problem. The correct idea is not form from function, but rather Function from Form.
Carting the Marble Machine down Elon's path will end at a painted midi-player. It's fundamentally, existentially, the wrong direction.
Function first requires us to precisely pin-point what the function of the marble machine is. It is not to play music, but to inspire. How does it inspire, by being a perfect machine that doesn't drop a single marble, or by being relatable in some way?
Sometimes the design being "dumb" is the main reason for its existence...
The whole concept of a marble music machine is "dumb". If it wasn't dumb there wouldn't be any reason to make it. So be careful so you don't remove too much of the "dumb" =P
I don’t know where you went but man I miss your videos. Hope you are well and thank you for all you’ve done.
MARTIN, SERIOUSLY, PLEASE MAKE AT LEAST A TALKNIG VIDEO, WE NEED TO SEE YOU MAN.
has it ever crossed your mind that people like your project exactly because its cool and unncessarily complex? i think the magnetic lift is awesome. if you really follow function over form you end up with boring efficient machines that are not original or charming in any way.
Yeah, exactly that. Otherwise a boring computer would do the job just fine 🤷♂
Exactly!
In case of the MMX, the form is part of the funtionality!
Nobody is interested in watching a boring machine just dropping marbles. The lifting system is one of the biggest selling points and without it there is no need in building it at all
I disagree first "work as intended and make sure make it simple then make improvement of design" it work in many aspect of development even software development (that's why engineer and designer always argue because some time designer don't know their design will make performance worse or bad)
@@newwayto2323 slapping some useless gears onto the machine after its already finished just for the looks adds nothing to the beauty.
What Martin is doing is a complex, layered mix of form and function. He's arrived at certain "form from function" solutions which he likes, and tries to keep those in even when the functionality turns out not to be optimal. But if he lets go of his darlings and pursues functionality a little more ruthlessly, he's going to end up finding other "form from function" beauties too.
It's an art piece! I would say form is just as important as function. I wouldn't be here if it were a boring practical machine. dropping a few marbles is part of it's charm.
I feel like the essential brief of 'music instrument that plays music with marbles with drums and a bass and a vibraphone' already results in an awesome looking crazy design.
I came to say exactly this. If the goal was to make the simplest way to make music, Martin could go into his DAW or sit at his piano because that question has already been answered for centuries. We’re all here BECAUSE the MMX is ridiculous. It’s a crazy idea that is a marvel of somehow making this insane thing functional, and the over the top extraneous mechanisms to achieve music are what makes it special
Exactly
I’m not sure you’ve grasped the point of what Martin is trying to say. It doesn’t just ‘drop a few marbles’. Pieces of it are literally exploding. If he doesn’t simplify, the machine will never be done, he’s completely right.
Agreed. Even if he wanted to still play instruments with falling marbles, a completely optimized function-over-form machine would be relatively easy and utterly BORING. He needs to recalibrate what his idea of "good enough" is so that he stops chasing engineering perfection. Some problems like jams and breaking parts are, of course, things that need to be addressed, but chasing ideal function is just going to result in the loss of whimsy.
Martin is a terrific composer. He should just give the machine a reasonable anount of reliability, then use it to play some tunes. Mission accomplished. Do something else.