Tom Lehrer's 'The Elements' animated

This is my attempt to animate the famous Elements song by Tom Lehrer. (If you want the lyrics, just do a web search for "Tom Lehrer Elements lyrics".)

I used the following software to create this:
• Visual C# Express
• AviSynth
• VirtualDub

It took me about 9 hours in total.

(This is a second version. The original version had a few errors which I've corrected.)

[NeitoNRiba]

What do 2 sodium atoms tell one another?
"I lost an electron"
"are you sure?"
"I'm positive"

[colinanderson]

I would make a pun, but all the good ones Argon.

[stephenbarringer]

My father used to win bets in college with this song. He would bet that he could recite the entire periodic table, and when people scoffed and bet he couldn't, he'd launch into this song (which as an actor and musician from childhood he'd found easy to memorize). Usually he didn't have to get more than halfway before the other person would give up. 😆

[jesshonz]

My chemistry teacher told us today she would give us 118 points of extra credit if anyone could sing this by the time of our final December 20th

[brunchmenu]

Helium walks into a bar.. the bartender looks at him and says, "sorry, we don't serve noble gasses here." Helium doesn't react.

[PoisoningOrchid]

2 guys walk into a bar.
One guy says "I'll have H2O".
Other guy says "I'll have H2O, too".
The other guy dies.

[riceyrice]

Tom Lehrer: "There's air, earth, water and fire."
Those days were much easier then.

*Crowd laughs*

[godfreyrust]

I see a huge debate thread below about whether this song is easier or harder to learn the element names from than a more recent one. That was never the point :) Lehrer (who was a Harvard mathematician and genius satirical songwriter) wrote this as a joke in the 1950s and used to introduce it saying "this may be useful to some of you one day in a somewhat bizarre set of circumstances". The whole point of it was that it's hard to remember and sing at that speed: I learned it as a kid in the early 60s by slowing the turntable on our record player down to 16rpm and writing the words out, and in doing so invented at least a dozen elements which don't exist, but I still pronounce when I sing it :)

[hamstercow]

I would make a joke about noble gasses but I probably would not get a reaction

[thekappachrist]

Why are Helium, Curium, and Barium the three medical elements?  Because if you can't Helium, or Curium, you BARIUM!!  HAHAHHAHAHH!
-Heimerdinger

[jamescarmody]

Not only is this a fun song to sing, but the elements are also grouped in fun ways!

Alliteration unites many pairs, like antimony, arsenic, and aluminum. Every inert gas is also mentioned in one fell swoop.

[lettuce]

I like how the elements that were discovered after the song was recorded appeared after the song was over

[JFrombaugh]

I first heard this song in middle school science class, in a documentary about the elements. I remember I was eating peach-flavored candy rings as a snack when it came on, and they filled in the spaces in the periodic table as he sang each element's name (just like this animation). One guy was all "Is this a real song!?!" (to which my science teacher replied yes), I remember giggling at Tom Lehrer's over-dramatized inhaling (0:23, 0:58), and another girl laughed at the way he says "discovered" at the end.
Anyway, that was 12 years ago. Just today I bought a pack of those very same candy rings from the gas station and watched this video while eating them, to bring back the nostalgia.

[iainpalin]

A classic! Not a lot of people know that earlier in his life Lehrer was a mathematician and scientist, which might explain some of his song subjects.

[tandborste]

Oxygen and potassium when on a date


It was ok.

[jeikowb]

Guys, don't judge, this video was made in 2008 and this song was composed even before the 1960s

[Haariroy]

Best animation that has ever been done for this song. Well done.

[ArenalK]

This is awesome. I love the end where you added the rest of the elements that hadn't been discovered by then.

[XKratosGamingX]

my teacher is offering a chocolate bar if I can sing this song, I think I might just buy a chocolate bar myself, much easier XD

[nob]

As it is stated in liner noted for Tom Lehrer's compilation released in 2000, _"The Remains of Tom Lehrer"_...
"Some of his songs have been translated into and/or recorded in Danish, Dutch, French, German, Hebrew, Hungarian, Norwegian, Spanish and Swedish,
which is doubly remarkable because there's so much intricate wordplay that one would guess it's untranslatable". (as worded by the one and only, Dr. Demento)

I, for one, tried to add my little brick to this noble cause and translate this song into Polish - and I have to very much agree with Dr. Demento because of that. It's been particularly hard, mainly because of one thing: unlike in Polish, in English 90% of the elements' names just end with "-ium" :) Which is not the case in other languages as well.