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Positive Youtube channels?
What are your favorite youtube channels to watch when you're in the mood for something positive and uplifting? No genre restrictions or anything, just something that really oozes the joy and passion that the creator has.
I'll throw this one out there to start: Bicycle Touring Pro. He makes wonderful, slow paced and positive documentaries about his solo and group travels on his bike around the world. If you ever want to just zone out for a moment, throw this on and you just might be inspired.
I was going to post this, but I figured I'd give someone else a chance. Big recommendation to this one, I think BDG will be a far bigger deal than a video game funny video guy from Polygon in a few years.
Great recommendation! I watched two of the videos, and it's so fun! Doing a super serious deep dive on random video game topics works great apparently. Also the host is really cute and good looking! Amazing.
This man is a gem. His videos are always to the point, no intro, no outro, get in, explain, do the deed, get out. He has no-nonsense attitude for locks, a dry sense of humour, and is exteremely talented in his art. Considering the video length (almost always under 5 min, many times under 3 min) and his general review remarks, I doubt he is getting much financial gain from it. But the channel is freaking' awesome.
Jay Foreman! Fun and insightful.
https://www.youtube.com/JayForeman
The Map Men series is hilarious: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5iJSXaVvao&list=PLfxy4_sBQdxy3A2lvl-y3qWTeJEbC_QCp
Politics Unboringed as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrQBTvRj0s8&list=PLfxy4_sBQdxzZNqvVQXcBPvsl1Zgzy2-q
Unfinished London is super interesting, and has the same humour: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjuD288JlCs&list=PLfxy4_sBQdxwf909hUFsM59Y0RC_k9fvV
Mr. JWags - A new channel from a guy that just freaking loves sumo and deep dives into it.
Forgotten Weapons - Zero politics, just the history and mechanics of typically old and obscure weaponry. Ian is just a great guy that loves the history, engineering, and stories behind weaponry. Often humorous, lighthearted, and poking fun at himself.
Jay Leno's Garage - The man has lots of cars, he likes other people's cars, he doesn't have any prejudices against any brand or type of car, he's probably forgotten more about cars that I'll ever know. Since 'rona hit he's been doing the channel solo (while still paying everyone on his staff to stay home and stay safe) which I can say I honestly adore. It's slower, there are less cuts, and he puts nearly every car up on his lift to show the underside while recording with his phone and, in true old man fashion, he's more concerned with sharing info and stories about the cars than he is getting a perfect shot so he'll frequently have his thumb in the frame.
Ryan Tuerck, Chris Forsberg, Stephan Papadakis - Three professional racers and car builders. Die hard car guys doing car stuff. It's difficult being angry working on your project cars and these guys get to do it for a living, all positive vibes.
This Old Tony - A machinist channel full of bad/dad jokes. What's not to love?
Abom79 - Another machinist channel from a guy named Adam. Adam is a multi-generational old school manual machinist. He knows his stuff, he sounds like a "good old boy", is modest, talks about his father and grandfather a lot, and having met him and spoken to others that have as well, just seems to truly be a good guy with a wealth of knowledge. Having watched him for years now I'm glad I've seen him grow out of the self confidence issues he's had in the past and encourages others.
Tom's Turbo Garage - Tom's one of those awkward funny guys, fun to watch, interesting projects where he shows both progress and setbacks.
Allen Millyard - Soft spoken Englishman with a homebuilt motorcycle channel. He does more with a drill press and welder, while explaining in detail how he does it, than I've seen some people with six figures worth of tools/equipment do.
The Engineer Guy - Easy to understand, without being dumbed down, explanations of mostly everyday objects by an incredibly good educator.
Positive person, not always positive channel
The History Guy - He has a degree in history, he loves history, and if you love history too this is the channel for you! (Sorry, I couldn't resist.) History Guy (and his wife who is mostly behind the camera, co-wrote the channel, authors many of the episodes, but occasionally appears in front of it) covers little known history, its impact, and why it should be remembered. While it is often positive and lighthearted and the channel itself is a positive one, I'm putting it under a spoilerbox as much of recorded history involves war, death, and injustices. I'd say the channel is about a 50/50 split of positive uplifting history and it's opposite. While he's overall an upbeat individual he occasionally has episodes (that I very much like) where he goes off script and you can feel his passion for the importance of a subject be it an injustice or simply awesome in its reach.
My wife saw me typing up this comment and wanted to add a few suggestions of her own:
Chocolate Cacao - An often funny, wordless, ASMR cooking channel.
Ophelia's Soapery - Wordless making of pretty soap.
Dollightful - A channel about making custom dolls that just exudes positivity. Funnily enough, my wife has no interest in making soap or dolls, she just enjoys the relaxing atmosphere and seeing how it's done.
That's about half my youtube subscriptions right there.... :)
In a similar vein I would add the blacksmith Alec Steele, woodworker Peter Millard and the history guy Lindybeige. Lindy isn't always positive because history isn't always nice, but he generally is and his sense of humour is exceedingly dry even by British standards.
Have you been following This Old Tony's collab with Ron Covell? They're making a dustpan, and Ron's videos are really, really great. He's incredibly knowledgable and I've learned quite a lot of stuff just from the 40 minutes of video he's released (so far) about making a dustpan.
One of my friends thinks it's funny that I watch so much of this kind of thing but honestly I never tire of watching skilled, passionate people talking about and doing the things they are good at and care about.
Which is also why I like seamstress Bernadette Banner
Nerd! :]
I've heard of Alec Steele, but admittedly passed the channel by out of my general distaste for the extremely high energy personality channels that frequently are behind the title cards I see there. I have to be in the mood for a non-stop action and yelling-with-excitement channel. Hadn't seen Peter Millard as I don't really care for woodworking, but I see that he has a series on DIY CNC which I'll check out as I'm building a 1000mm squared CNC router sometime soon. So thanks for that. I have seen Lindybeige and he does have good videos (plus I love dry British humor), but they tend to be a little long for when I'd consume them. The under 20 minutes mark fits quite well with the breakfast-with-my-wife time.
I have not and I'm going to now! Didn't even know it was occurring and want to say I'd never seen the channel but I see that I have watched his Bomber Seat video, so I have no idea why I'm not subscribed... Thanks for the reminder!
Emphasis to say I'm right there with you. I have next to zero interest in building or even being on a boat, but I can listen to and watch Louis Sauzedde build, restore, repair, or just talk about boats nearly any day of the week. Which is extra hypocritical of me as the previously mentioned lack of interest in woodworking.
Hadn't seen that one, but sent it off to the wife for review. I know there's some 50's pin-up and other vintage style seamstress channel she enjoys, but I can't remember what it is for the life of me.
Alec's not quite as shouty as he might at first appear. He's very young (22 now, I think) and is enthusiastic but rarely (at least for me) comes off as being over the top. He does know his stuff though.
I must admit that I'd forgotten about Tips From a Shipwright. I binged the entire first boat series in a few days a couple of years back, I had no idea there was any more - thanks for the reminder! That dude is absolutely amazing, and I'm forever thankful to whoever it is who decided to put him on video because now all that knowledge and skill will be preserved. I learned loads of very specific and probably never useful stuff and some more general and extremely useful things from that series. I'm never going to need to build a boat any more than I'll need to make a dustpan but it's the little, everyday things which you can transfer into other parts of life that make listening to these older guys so valuable.
Woah! What a great list. I need to check back on many of these, but I'm instantly hooked on Chocolate Cacao. Your wife has great taste! Thanks for typing this out.
I love the videos he makes, I just wish there were more of them. It's always nice when once a year a new video shows up and surprises me.
Baumgartner Restoration conserves old, sometimes extremely damaged paintings. Seeing a painting go from a filthy, torn mess to a pristine state not seen for decades, or maybe even 100+ years, is really enjoyable.
Grand Illusions - An incredibly sweet elderly guy presenting pieces from his massive toy collection. His enthusiasm for his hobby is what really makes it great, although there are some genuinely fascinating toys on display.
Townsends - A channel about life in the late 18th, early 19th century US. Lots of cooking videos, but my favorites are the build videos. Most recently they built a log cabin and have begun furnishing the property with things like an earthen oven, various workbenches, and most recently they've been creating bricks to build a hearth around the fireplace inside the cabin.
Practical Engineering - A civil engineer demonstrates concepts from his field. Most recently he talked about how storm drainage systems work. He often utilizes elaborate small-scale models and props to explain concepts. Just neat all around.
OUROBOROS ARQ - A bunch of videos of a guy building small-scale stuff the way you would large-scale. Like for example, he recently started creating a small house and he mixed little bags of concrete and used little tiny steel rods as rebar.
First of all, sorry for fluff. When it is something serious, I strictly prefer to receive information in the form of text rather than all those watery videos.
So if I am in the mood for something positive or uplifting in the video form, I look for marble runs. I especially prefer country marble races, such as those created by Raptersonic.
Via the YouTube sidebar links, I found a similar great channel less than a day ago: Brad's Marble Races.
I like watching the scambaiter Kitboga's YouTube channel. It is always full of laughs, wholesome, and a welcome relief from worrying about work or politics. He essentially baits scammers into going through their scripts, while making the process difficult for them. He is a talented voice actor who performs each call in character.
If you are into software, he builds absurd number of tools to throw curveballs on scammers on his system as they walk through whatever scam he is doing. He maintains fully functional clones of bank websites where scammers will enter bank information (for external transfers) that is subsequently reported. This also keeps using up the scammers time (as they buy into him being a legitimate, cooperative victim,) with some spending over 30 hours on the phone with Kitboga.
I'd like to watch more of Kitboga but every time I try to I get second-hand embarrassment for the scammers when Kit starts doing the more interesting parts of his bit. I know they're scammers and all but I just can't help cringe through some pretty major parts of his videos/streams.
But I still try because those videos are absolutely hilarious.
Oh yes. I remember once having to stay way too late on a work night watching Kitboga live luring this one Indian scammer on for two and a half hours. In the end the guy ended up kind of having a change of heart and it's a moment I cherish. :)
I've seen that happen. The scammer seems to genuinely regret what he's doing. But then later on that week Kitboga gets scammed by the same guy.
Simone Giertz's videos and inventions never fail to brighten my day.
How Ridiculous is three aussie blokes who do ridiculous things. A significant amount of their channel is dropping things from a 45m gravity tower and seeing what happens. The things ramp up over time, so I would recommend going way back and starting on videos from a few years ago because something like dropping a bowling ball 45m onto the head of an axe seems really tame compared to what they are doing now (like "dropping an airplane onto an intensely engineered kevlar trampoline") but they're still very interesting. They also have done a wide variety of trick shots, and other impressive sports related things. There's a video of them using a waboba (bouncing water ball) that's just full of delight. Generally speaking, they're upbeat, passionate, and spread generally good messages. I watch with my 6 year old son all the time; they're very wholesome.
Good Mythical Morning is another show that usually makes me feel good to have watched it. Rhett and Link are both strongly upbeat, and their strong positive personalities make most of their shows delightful. It's just two southern US guys who do funny things. Some typical "bits" that they do are "Will it [foodstuff]" where they ask a question like "Will it Cupcake?" and then they try cupcakes made out of things one wouldn't normally make cupcakes out of. Another fun thing is "putting things in things - [thing] edition", eg. "Vice Edition" where they put things in a vice and guess how many cranks it will take to break. Or "Where in the world does this international foodstuff come from" where they try something from a mystery country and then throw darts at a map while trying to get closest to the country it is from. It's all upbeat.
Second on both of these. How Ridiculous and GMM share this wholesome, comfy, and truly entertaining atmosphere that can be a welcome relief from the stresses of the day.
Sebastian Lague makes fantastic content about programming (more aimed at programmers than beginners) - it's full of really interesting ideas (lots of work with GPU shaders), beautiful simulations, and a very cute kitty cat.
I also really enjoy Daily Dose of Internet - it's just a compilation of cute videos and uplifting stuff. It sounds a little trite from that explanation, but the person who curates the channel seems wonderful and has stated that his goal is to make the internet a happier place. It's always pretty relaxing, even if it's not educational.
Wow, thank you so much for the Daily Dose of Internet recommendation. This is great! I have so much to catch up on in this thread but I had to check this one out immediately based on the description.
It's not my usual sort of thing but there's something very cheering about the relentless and apparently entirely genuine joy of Ali Spagnola which I find hard to resist.
See also Micarah Tewers, which again on paper is not someone I'd expect to enjoy but she just oozes authenticity and wonder and somehow that works.
I love Micarah. With so many videos with experts it's nice to see someone who freestyles everything and makes the occasional mistake. And I don't know any other youtube personality who fills their videos with so much genuine love.
My husband has one that he swears by as a way to calm down and just watch when doing something else. So much so I contacted the channel owner (who isn't a big start youtuber exactly) and managed to get a signed fan-photo of him for my husbands birthday. It's about wood turning, with this dude from the US. My husband don't own the equipment to do woodturning, neither is he interested in woodturning.
Tim Yoder - Woodturning
Personally I kind of like Lets Plays. From some CSGO youtubers (like Houngoungagne or Warowl) to the Minecraft group Hermitcraft.
Noah Caldwell-Gervais has some great deep dives into today's and yesterday's classic games. He's a great narrator if you haven't heard any of his stuff and if you spent any of your formative years around the turn of the millennium some of his videos are a great trip down nostalgia lane.
I really love DIY Perks. It's just a guy making all sorts of cool projects. The best way to think of it is arts and crafts on steroids.
There's just something fun about watching whatever impractical and seemingly crazy contraptions he can put together. The end products are hardly ever particularly practical but they are cool.
(I also find his accent weirdly soothing)
If you're a fan of someone who loves making music, art and electronic builds with whatever he has lying around, I found a great channel in Simon the Magpie and above all, his enthusiasm makes the channel work, even if the experiment doesn't.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKLmntfj3NmM2E3_LB3qs-w
Buttplugg.io the Open Source channel to follow. Filthy, naughty, friendly and about FOSS tech. The dude who is buttplug.io is one of the friendliest people I have ever talked to and the leap between sex, privacy and FOSS is often unexplored and he is the person to do it.
My girlfriend likes Tier Zoo, a channel that talks about evolutionary biology/zoology in video game terms. It's a bit similar to /r/outside/, but much more educational and focused on evolution specifically. I like the Raptor Let's Play.
Oh found this one Unintentional ASMR - Welsh Stonecutter
I've only checked this one video where an elderly gentleman talks softly about stonecutting, ways to check the sharpness of tools and why Calligraphy isn't exactly what he's doing, while softly tapping away at a chisel - but the channel is saved there for me