FAQ for domino laymen

How many dominoes do you have, how long have you been doing this, and isn't that getting boring?

Currently 26 000, since 1999 (when I was seven), no.

How long does it take to set up these things?

Depends on what "thing" you're setting up.

I'm a really slow builder because I'm terribly perfectionist. On projects of average difficulty, I set up 300 to 500 dominoes an hour; but as I said, that's quite a low number. Many builders' standard is 1000. I do reach 1000 or more when I'm just building lines (or not being perfectionist for once, of course).

At CDT, we have often reached far more than 1000 dominoes in a quarter of an hour when we had three or four people build connection lines. So, basically, you can't give a general answer on how long it takes to set up a certain number of dominoes.

Imagine you dropped a domino in the middle of the design, and it all toppled! Has that ever happened?

It often surprises me how many people seem to think that toppling some dominoes by accident during the building would be an extremely rare or dramatic incident. It is, after all, pretty normal. The better you get at domino-building, the less mistakes you make, but you can never fully eliminate them; but you've learned to deal with it, and to react quickly and stop the dominoes instead of standing back, frozen in shock. There are some kinds of accidents though that you hardly ever get used to: 3D projects - as you have no chance of stopping them at all, so when you build them, you know that the first wrong movement will destroy everything again. And it can be really annoying when one or two lines in the middle of a field topple because that is really hard to repair.

Do you have anything to do with Domino Day? Ever been a builder there?

Nope - expect that, like many colleagues, I started building dominoes because of Domino Day (after watching it on TV in 1999). Unfortunately, I haven't been able to join Domino Day so far because I just turned 18 in 2010, and the last Domino Day took place in 2009 - it doesn't look like there's going to be another one ever.

My only contact to Domino Day so far was having a domino trick I invented (the "pirouette") used in Domino Day 2009. The organisators had watched a video on YouTube where I show that trick, and then contacted me. I also met three Domino Day builders at CDT 2010, including Marcel Kamps who has been a builder at most Domino Days.

Are you paid for all that in any way?

Not yet - but I hope I will earn some money via the YouTube Partner Programme soon. Domino is hardly a job to do for a living, but it can be a quite profitable sideline

Where can I apply for Domino Day 2011?

Not at all - there won't be a Domino Day 2011.


FAQ for domino-builders / Other things

What are your personal records?

Toppled dominoes: solo 8551 / in a team 116,000 (see "CDT")

Biggest field: 4452 dominoes

Biggest 2D pyramid: 63

Biggest 3D pyramid: 15x14

Most dominoes stacked on one: 289

Most dominoes set up in one minute: 100

How do you plan your fields?

Usually by hand. I'm a bit old-fashioned there, and I'm just more flexible than with computer programmes. I do use MS Paint though when it comes to images I'm not capable of drawing, like portraits.

Your favourite Domino Day so far?

2002!

What camera do you use?

From 2005-2010, I used digital cameras - one got broken, two (!) were stolen - by Canon. Since July 2010, I have a Full HD camera called JVC Everio GZ-HD 40 (what a tuneful name :D), which I can absolutely recommend to you in case you are looking for a good camera.

And what editing software?

Magix Video Deluxe since May 2008, until then good old Movie Maker ;-)

How did you get this homepage, and how much did it cost?

I used Jimdo to create it, and yes, it does cost a few cents per day (60 euros a year), but I think that's a really low price for what you get at Jimdo - as you can see, there aren't even any ads on this homepage. If you ever want to make your own homepage, I really recommend you to use Jimdo - it's fast, simple, you don't need to know anything about programming, the help center deserves the name "help center", there are no hidden costs and so on. You won't find a better website provider.