The Ridiculous History Behind My Weirdest Video

I know this is pretty different from my normal videos, but I think that after diving in to the history of this 80 year old joke, you'll understand how it fits in to everything. Plus I think it's just fun, so I hope you enjoy it!

• This article covers the history pretty well:

•And of course Wikipedia can fill in most of the gaps:

📼 The Timeline of Encabulator Videos:

⏱ Chapter Markers:
0:00 - It Takes A Lot Of Work To Do Dumb Stuff
0:53 - How I Discovered The Encabulator
2:05 - Origins Of The Encabulator
4:28 - The First Film: Bud Haggart 1977
5:47 - The Second & Third Films: 1988 & 1997
7:03 - The “Lost” 1996 Chrysler Film
8:51 - Making My Own Version
10:26 - Building The Deluxe Photo Encabulator
14:44 - Recording The Ridiculous Script

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– Who Am I? –

Hi! My name is Tom Buck. As a lifelong A/V nerd, I’m here to help you level up the audio and video quality of your streams, podcasts, puns, and videos. I was a high school Digital Media teacher for 11 years, and I started this channel in 2017 as a project to share my enthusiasm for digital media and teaching others while having fun along the way.

New videos are uploaded every Thursday morning, and more often when possible!

•Read my Ethics Statement about objective reviews, sponsored content, and brand partnerships:

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Episode 264: Let's Talk About My Dumbest Video: The Deluxe Photo Encabulator

[tombuck]

Here's the finished Deluxe Photo Encabulator video:

[pixelsandtape]

The Rockwell cabinet (yes, with the squeaky door) was an actual product. Mike Kraft did a regular corporate marketing video for it, and then we had extra time and made the Retroincabulator video as an internal “ice-breaker” for meetings.
I was the editor on it.
Thanks for compiling the history!

[thesisypheanjournal]

The crew asked how he was able to read the script with such a straight face and he said, "It sounds like everything else you have me read."

[AllWillPower]

This is a SURPRISING amount of history for a joke, thanks for putting this all in context!

[kwameryan]

Hey Tom! Watching this in Germany today and thought you might like to know that the translation of that book title is “The Paper for Electrotechnical Static Thunder and Lightning”. Now that’s what I call 100% commitment in service of a joke!

[MSladekPhoto]

My great grandfather worked with Tesla (Nikola, not the electric car) on the ORIGINAL Encabulator - the predecessor to the Retro and Turbo Encabulator. He would tell stories of how difficult it was to maintain the flux bearings while ensuring the correct positronic alignment of the scissor switches. In the end, genius triumphed! And now, you proudly carry on the tradition of understanding the true purpose of the Encabulator. May your quasistatic regeneration oscillators ever be aligned with your phase inverters!

[danaschoen]

The thing that makes this so enjoyable for those of us in the industry (in my case, industrial maintenance), is this. This cabinet is a legit motor control system. There is a motor relay, real buttons and switches that actually do something in the real world. The companies are all legit companies that make parts for rotating equipment and controls. Only the narration is (near) complete gibberish. The fun is in the delivery. For other tech geeks out there, this is what we sound like to other people.

[ACDoesIt]

I used to do PR for Rockwell Automation. I can confirm, the retro encabulator was a meme before memes.

[zeanamush]

My father worked for Rockwell and the Retro-encabolator vid was always brought out for job fairs and trade shows.

[support]

It’s the mechanical engineering version of “All your base are belong to us”

[jwbrooks]

To be fair, the turbo version encabulator did prevent side fumbling.

[ScottBurnette]

So, I have been working with Rockwell automation products and we watched this at work back in the 90's. The components he was showing controls electric motors . There were some slick marketing ploys back in the day. Enjoying your videos.

[robertburton]

They say the Dharma Initiative had almost perfected the Quantum Encabulator in the early 80’s on the Lost island

[aroncontinuousconversation]

You have NO IDEA how much I'm learning right now with this video. Workflow-wise, general culture, creation process. I hope you can keep creating this type of content. Thanks.

[ac]

Had no idea it was a whole universe going back almost 100 years! Everything about the encabulator is awesome!

[Jim_Mundy]

I loved your original video and really enjoyed this follow up. There is a whole lot to learn just from your production and editing of the original and you letting us see behind the curtain here. Thanks for all you bring to the community. Tom Buck ROCKS!!!

[engjnr]

Ok one thing you have to understand is that people from the 60's to the 80's didn't have much in the form of cell phones and pocket games so we read the data sheets of everything and most companies had them either in the toilets or lounge areas and everybody would be sitting there reading data sheets. I still recall all the ingredients from air fresheners in bathrooms. Propellants like propane were common 😳

[TheMitchingHour]

I love this so much. I laughed so hard at the first vid, I knew it had to be a joke but I wasn’t completely sure as I’m new to the channel. That slow realisation after total confusion was a delight.

[nmitch]

That video was pure Internet Gold. Loved it and love your dedication to this channel.

[martybeyer]

Thank you Tom, my favourite youtube video of 2021 now has some context. This was pure fun, not dumb 😂👍