The odds of accomplishing such a feat (five matching dice showing any number) are 1 in 1,296.
I achieved the feat on the 627th roll. According to Alan's spreadsheet and graph (below), there was a 38% probability I would have reached my goal so early.
To reach a 95% chance of success, I'd have needed 3,881 rolls.
Below, in his own words, is Phil's explanation of what they did:
BY PROFESSOR PHIL MORIARTY (note timings are mapped to start of the song, not the YouTube videos)
Here are all the gory details for the musicians amongst you...
Guitar tuning: Bb F Bb Eb G C
(This is traditional “drop D” tuning, i.e. D A D G B E, dropped two tones in order to approximate the math metal/Djent sound without a seven string guitar.)
We stick almost exclusively to riffs derived from the Bb harmonic minor scale (although the chorus is based around the natural Bb minor scale).
I used Guitar Rig to record the riffs (both clean and effected) which I then sent to Dave who used his studio wizardry and musical acumen to arrange and structure the song.
This involved quite a number of e-mail exchanges to hone the structure of the song during which Dave had to rein in my old school metal tendencies on more than one occasion.
Riff-by-riff
0:00: We kick off with a clean picked piece which looks like this:
The digits of phi are “embedded” in the notes played on the 4th and 3rd strings.
I make use of octaves and finger picking to embellish the riff.
0:08: Dave comes in with sixteenth note “chugs” (on Bb) which are timed to match the digits of phi (as explained in the video).
00:16: All hell breaks loose. Same idea as for ‘chug’ pattern starting at 0:08, except this time matched by kick drums.
1:11: Here we switch to ‘encoding’ the [1 + sqrt (5)]/2 representation of phi in the riff.
It’s a much more old school metal riff and involves lots of use of the open sixth string (first note of the Bb harmonic minor scale) to incorporate ‘1’.
The digits of sqrt (5) are then encoded as shown in the tablature below.
I wanted to get a somewhat Mastodon-esque feel here so used lots of octaves (and slides into octaves).
I tried to down-pick as much as possible to ‘drive’ the riff . The ½ of (1+sqrt(5))/2 is built in as half-time on the drums.
1:27: I very much wanted to have a heavily Tool-influenced riff in the song. Tool are math metal pioneers and, as many of those who have watched the “Golden Ratio – Making a Math Metal Anthem” video have pointed out, their song Lateralus has lyrics which are based around the Fibonacci sequence. So, the following is my ‘homage’ to Tool...
The digits of phi are encoded in the notes on the sixth and fifth strings and I ‘pedal’ around Bb notes on the third, fourth, and fifth strings.
2:15:As explained by Dave in the video, his riff here is also derived from (1 + root 5 )/ 2.
Root 5 is embedded in the number of chugs again and the drums are half time.
The “1” is a sustained and ringing Bb note.
Lyrics
Irrational!
Real but uncountable
Non-transcendental!
At the root of the problem
Patterns will
Emerge from the equation
Golden Angle
Sprials out of control
Chorus:
The proportion is divine
You'll find your way
to Phi (to Phi) (to Phi)
The ratio defined
You can’t deny
it's Phi
The five-fold way
Forbidden symmetry
Crossing points define
Demonic geometry
--- Verse 1 is fairly self-explanatory. Verse 2 above is a little more obscure. It refers to the pentagram which, of course, is a key piece of metal ‘iconography’. The verse refers to five-fold symmetry which is directly linked to phi ---
The trip included attending the VidCon conference in Anaheim, which was a huge three-day event for all sorts of YouTubers.
Education really was a tiny part of the massive event, but we did have an education panel hosted by Angela Lin from YouTube... Here are the panellists.
ViHart, Hank Green, Henry Reich, Angela, Mike Rugnetta, Me, John Green
The panel was standing room only (see below), with many people unfortunately turned away.
View from the podium
An earlier panel about physics was run by Henry, Derek and Destin and was also standing room only - the science stuff was proving popular!
Destin also set up an impromptu (and unauthorised!) session where people were allowed to experience his high-speed Phantom camera.
Destin (in yellow) shows off the Phantom
People took turns slapping each other's faces and watching it back in high speed!!!
Here's me being whacked by two of the most famous hands on YouTube:
MinutePhysics and ViHart slap Brady
Earlier in the week, prior to the madness of VidCon, the science film-makers were at the Perimeter Institute in Waterloo, Canada.
This was for an even dubbed BrainSTEM, a more intimate gathering of people with an interest in online education.
Professor Mike Merrifield - a regular in films for Sixty Symbols and Deep Sky Videos - came along for this event.
It was called an "unconference", the idea being that the format was rather free-flowing and informal. We often gathered in smaller groups for themed discussions which were more like conversations than meetings.
I've also filmed a few videos with my fellow science YouTubers and will hopefully be posting soon... For now, here's the first one I filmed with Henry about how he makes his wildly successful MinutePhysics videos.
One little extra shout-out to end my blog... I managed to forget my camera battery recharger and found it hard to find one at VidCon.
But a young film-maker named Micah went the extra mile and loaned me his charging cable... He didn't have to. If anyone has read my blog this far and wants to repay a young lad who helped me in a time of need, why not subscribe to his fledging YouTube channel.
Blog goes behind the scenes with video journalist Brady Haran.
Brady's working on various projects, including the successful Periodic Table of Videos, Sixty Symbols and Numberphile.
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