Get curated editors’ picks, peeks behind the scenes, film recommendations and more.
This video by the French computer programmer Damien Henry is a clever visual demonstration of machine learning – a term coined by the US computer scientist Arthur Samuel (1901-1990) to describe an algorithm that gives computers the ‘ability to learn without being explicitly programmed’.
Using several videos recorded from windows during train rides, Henry trained an algorithm to predict what the next frame of a train ride should look like. Then, starting with a single frame chosen by Henry, the algorithm generated, to the best of its ability, scenes from an hour-long train ride, improving itself roughly every 20 seconds. The resulting video demonstrates machine learning in action through a dreamy, impressionistic take on the experience of observing flowing, fleeting landscapes passing by. Though machine-learning algorithms are used more practically in applications where adaptability is greatly advantageous, such as anti-virus software and driverless cars, there’s an undeniable charm to seeing a computer engage in a version of one of our more ephemeral but corporeal experiences – the train ride.
Via Kottke.org
Director: Damien Henry
video
Food and drink
Local tensions simmer amid a potato salad contest at the Czech-Polish border
14 minutes
video
Technology and the self
A filmmaker finds a tactile beauty in the creation of her prosthetic leg
11 minutes
video
Knowledge
An Indigenous myth and a geological survey elicit two ways of knowing one place
4 minutes
video
Biology
Beetles take flight at 6,000 frames per second in this perspective-shifting short
9 minutes
video
War and peace
A war meteorologist’s riveting account of how the Allies averted a D-Day disaster
6 minutes
video
Physics
What does it look like to hunt for dark matter? Scenes from one frontier in the search
7 minutes
video
Technology and the self
How the magic of photography brought Victorian England closer to the spirit realm
16 minutes
video
Home
An artist endeavours to bring the Moon down to Earth in a ritual of yearning
5 minutes
video
Information and communication
An animation built from road signs is a whirlwind study of flash communication
2 minutes