Blog Posts - a Machine Of Words

a Machine Of Words

How To Green Screen For Fun And Profit!

9/3/2018

In this lovely little video I show you the magic of green screen. Hopefully in a funny way. At least I laughed. And if you can't laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at?
Mice, I guess.
And possibly dogs getting confused about where their owners go when they drop a blanket. You know...in those viral videos where the owner sets up a blanket and then runs away before its dropped and the dogs all like "WTF?!"
Anyway. I use trending words liberally in this video, because I wan money, and selling out isn't a bad thing anymore.
HOPE YOU ENJOY IT!

Super Mario Propaganda!

9/2/2018

Playing around with (mostly) free domain film footage. After rummaging through stock I found this Mushroom Kingdom propaganda film.
Enjoy.

Slime Has A Way

8/27/2018

The Genesis of this video goes back a long time; since I was an older, bored sibling.
Originally I thought of it as a children's book (and still do. I've been "working" on the illustrations for a while now). Of course, making a video and creating slime were adventures that I didn't have the access to as a youth. Video cameras were massively expensive, looking up slime recipes was rare, and even if I did make a video....who would I have distributed it to?
Family...friends...no way of actually going viral.
But now, with todays technology I was finally able to produce something that looks like would have been made way back in the 90's....so I am very sorry.
On the plus side, I got to play around with a little editing programs (also not available to me back in MY DAY!), some sound, some end credits that in the old days would have been done with a Mario Paint game for the SNES and a VCR, all in roughly an hour.
Not bad, eh?
If young Judas had access to these pieces of movie making magic, truly you would have seen films worthy of Ed Wood.

Sit back, relax, and laugh at an old mans attempt to bring his teenage years to fruition.

Love, Bio Ethics, and...Murder?!

6/19/2018

https://api.spreaker.com/v2/episodes/15081757/download.mp3

https://api.spreaker.com/v2/episodes/15081820/download.mp3

https://www.spreaker.com/episode/15081886

https://www.spreaker.com/episode/15081844

Hey Cogs!

Just a few links to my podcasts. I'm trying to go regular, so send me your ideas!

I Haven't Seen It! Episode 4

6/2/2018

Andrew and I talk about the new Solo movie, some girl from Game of Thrones, Trollhunters, and the effects of a car starting.

The Basics Of Finding Fault Episode 3: Alien Octopus! And Lovecraft!

5/21/2018

It's Been a While

5/8/2018

Hi.
It's been a while.

I've traveled around the world, seen some pretty boring things, been away from my amazing family, and written very little.

The bonus of everyone being on lockdown is that I have time to create a little more, and you have time to watch!
And you're hungry for content, aren't you?

Well, I should be the one giving it to you.

And I have! Recently I just had a contest on my Patreon for a hand made Skeletor "Live, Love, Laugh" fridge magnet, and wouldn't you know it? The woman who won had a baby! How's that for amazing! Wasn't even MY baby. She just had one.
I'd like to think it's because of how awesome my magnetic painting is.

Thanks to those that stayed through my non-posting, and thanks to those who fell away.

I'm still on Twitter (barely) and on Instagram and Facebook. Subscribe, pay me the equivalent of a Starbucks Coffee once a month so that i can keep making this terrible content.

Thanks Cogs,

Sincerely, Judas X. Machina.

The Great Emu War

5/8/2018

The Great Emu War

Western Australia, 1932

Campion

It is a time of great turmoil for the Australian people. The Emu, nature's deadliest giant chicken, has invaded the shores of Campion.

20,000 emus, migrating after their breeding season, have begun to head to the coast from inland. With the lands previously cleared by British veterans and ex soldiers for the purpose of farming, these mindless economic migrants have found the cultivated land good habitat, and have begun to appropriate the area.

The government, terrorized by these flightless, walnut brained birds has called upon its mightiest warriors; Major G.P.W. Meredith, and the Royal Australian Artillery.

These brave men, armed only with the Lewis gun that is only able to fire a mere 500 rounds per second, went face to face with the feathered menace on the 2nd of November, 1932.

The Minister of Defense, Sir George Pearce readily dispatches the soldiers, conducted under the command of Major G.P.W. Pearce of the Seventh Heavy Battery of the Royal Australian Artillery.

Originally begun in October, rainfall caused delay of the war since it had caused the emus to scatter over a wider area…
With the ceasing of the rain on November 2nd, Meredith gave the orders to commence the war and collect 100 emu skins, to be used to make hats…for the light horsemen.

50 emus were sighted near the Campion region!
They were out of range.
Meredith bravely commanded local farmers to herd the emus into an ambush. But the emus split into smaller groups and ran, becoming difficult targets.
Yet all was not lost, as 12 whole birds were killed.

Two days passed without incident from either side.
Then, on Novemebr 4th, Major Meredith established an ambush near a local dam, where nearly 1,000 emus were spotted.
Their guns jammed and 12 unarmed, flightless, walnut brained birds died at the hands of the brave, well armed soldiers. The rest of the birds scattered.

In the days that followed Meredith attempted to keep a stiff upper lip, and resume the war further south where the birds were reported to be “rather tame.”
But the birds had learned.

General Blackfeather Emu Spits Spits, a six foot Emu with beautiful black plumage, had taken charge of a flock of Emus, acting as look out while his moronic mates carried out their work of destruction, warning them of Merediths attacks.

The two warriors made eye contact, and knew that neither would back down in the coming days.
With a flash of brilliance, Meredith demands that the Lewis gun be attached to a truck!
This proved to be effective, as the birds are faster than the truck, and the terrain so rough that the gunner was unable to fire any shots.

By November 8th, six days after the first engagement, two thousand rounds of ammunition had been fired. The number of Emus killed; uncertain. Accounts range from 2 to five hundred.
Meredith bolsters himself with the good news that at the very least, his men have suffered no casualties.
Meredith began to withdraw his troops.

After the withdrawal, Major Meredith compared the emus to Zulus and commented on the striking maneuverability of the emus, even while badly wounded.

“If we had a military division with the bullet-carrying capacity of these birds it would face any army in the world... They can face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks. They are like Zulus whom even dum-dum bullets could not stop.”

The Emu terror continued, however. Attacks on crops reached an almost epidemic rate, and Meredith and his men attempted to lead another charge on the dreaded menace.

Taking to the field on 13 November 1932, the military found a degree of success over the first two days, with approximately 40 emus killed. The third day, 15 November, proved to be far less successful, but by 2 December the guns were accounting for approximately 100 emus per week. Meredith was recalled on 10 December, and in his report he claimed 986 kills with 9,860 rounds, at a rate of exactly 10 rounds per confirmed kill. In addition, Meredith claimed 2,500 wounded birds had died as a result of the injuries that they had sustained.

The war, however, was a complete failure. The Dreaded Emus, like the nefarious Texans, they continued to persist.

Hilary Clinton NUDE?!?!?!

4/6/2018

No. I am not going to show you nude photos of Hillary Clinton.
BUT
During the 1940's to the 1970's Harvard university had a bizarre requirement for all incoming freshman; they asked all young men and women enrolled in their first year to pose nude.
Thousands of pictures were taken of such students as Diane Sawyer, George Bush, and Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Back in 1995 NYT reporter Ron Rosenbaum found out this story and was the first to report it.
I like to bring it up because some students are now complaining that they have to use clear plastic back packs and say they are an "invasion of privacy". And while this was voluntary...it would not be very acceptable now.
The reasoning behind this strange request was that a scientist of psychology, William Herbert Sheldon, believed he could study, track, and research diseases such as rickets, scoliosis, and other posture issues.
Sheldons written works infered something else...an attempt to study the correlation between a persons body shape and their intelligence.

And no written permission of any kind was given by the students.
And then there were rumors of break-ins at the university where the photos were stored, with many pilfered photos supposedly ending up on the black market...

“You always thought when you did it that one day they’d come back to haunt you. That 25 years later, when your husband was running for President, they’d show up in Penthouse,” confessed Sally Quinn who graduated from a Seven Sisters college, Smith in 1963.

PODCAST: The Basics of Finding Fault ep 1; the "Problem" of Suicide

4/5/2018

I could put all I've spoken on my new podcast into a nice, typed, friendly fonted little package!
But I won't.
Please, enjoy the sultry sound of my voice as I explain and find no good reason why you shouldn't kill yourself.
And on that note...I beg you to email me, come up with response letters, your own podcast rebuttals, all to prove me wrong!

Enjoy.

The Problem Of Suicide