Seam carving (2020) [video] | Hacker News Reader

Seam carving (2020) [video]

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166 pointsttsiodras11 comments

This presentation is so good. It really helps you appreciate how wide the gap is between mediocre and excellent instruction. This video explains in 30 minutes that took years of classes in computer vision for me to grasp at an intuitive level. Convolution, gradient, energy based models, dynamic programming. Grant is a national treasure.

He is a worldwide treasure.

For all the negativity that modern internet has brought, we forget that a poor Indian kid with a cheap smartphone can watch Stanford lectures on astrophysics. Just think how crazy this was even 20 or 30 years ago! Anyone with an internet connection has access to more books than she could ever read in a lifetime, lectures and videos from the best learning institutions and the best teachers in the world (such as 3b1b), they can ask questions to knowledgeable people and fellow students... Magical, for millenia this was inconceivable.

This man deserves so much respect. He even open-sourced the software he created to generate his videos, allowing more people to create similar helpful content.

I'm sure a lot more kids would be interested in math if they were able to visualize the beauty of it in a more vivid manner than just chalkboard drawings.

And one more reason why the phrase "Those who can, do. Those who can't teach." is so wildly off base. The multiplicative impact of an effective teacher is incredible.

Just think of the number of people who who have learned from his videos and have used it gain a deeper understanding, been inspired to learn more, or used it to go and do to exciting things.

The amount of impact he has had by effective and concisely explaining complex topics is incredible.

Here is the link the current (in-progress) course materials. It's a really nice site with each lesson posted as a notebook:

https://computationalthinking.mit.edu/Spring21/seamcarving/

or the previous (complete) course:

https://computationalthinking.mit.edu/Fall20/

Huge Sanderson fan and thought the video was excellent

Also a huge Dali fan and like to think Salvador would have been delighted by Grant calling his self portrait ‘a weird/strange monster creature’

This is probably posted because there was a JavaScript seam carving demo on the front page earlier today.

I think one of the interesting things about this demo being in Julia was that Julia was chosen for this “Introduction to Computational Thinking”-course over Python, because Python is too slow to do seam carving (and presumably it’s too cumbersome to bend numpy to do it as well - at least I couldn’t come up with a solution that didn’t require several loops)

Still impressed every time how well Sanderson is able to use his visualization and presentation skills to make explanations so good.

Came here to make much the same comment. I cannot tell you how many videos of his I have watched regarding complex mathematical subjects which are well beyond me, yet still he allowed me to walk away with a reasonable understanding. His clear explanations coupled with impressive visualizations make for a powerful learning experience.

Particularly at a time when so much education is online, Sanderson is the gold standard for teaching IMHO.

Grant Sanderson, professional fucking legend

I think he's in a different profession.

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