Leonardo’s Machines
Like Duolingo, but for Leonardo’s Machines. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
For the part of you with thirty open tabs that never became anything.
75 levels across 9 sections, about 150 minutes end to end, roughly 30 days at five minutes a day. It moves through The Mind of the Inventor, The Grammar of Motion, Conquest of the Air, Engineering for the Battlefield, Mastering the Elements: Water, The Built Environment, Precision and Measurement, Bio-Engineering and Automata, and From Paper to Reality. It assumes you already know the basics.
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Key ideas in Leonardo’s Machines
- Leonardo's natural left-handedness
- Saper Vedere and direct observation
- Mirror writing as a security measure
- Saper Vedere and bird wings
- Mirror writing as a mental speed bump
- Rejection of scholastic authority
- The dual purpose of Leonardo's mirror writing
- The application of 'Saper Vedere' in engineering
- Leonardo used the spiral descent of seeds to conceptualize vertical lift
- He mapped the way tendons pull bone to create mechanical pulleys and levers
- Nature's efficiency was his primary blueprint for solving friction and drag
- Loose sketches allowed for 'componimento inculto' or intuitive, messy brainstorming
- The application of 'Saper Vedere' (knowing how to see) in engineering
- Leaving details vague invited constant iteration rather than locking in a flawed design
- Exploded views show how individual components fit together in 3D space
- Connecting natural biological patterns to mechanical solutions
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives Leonardo’s Machines the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
According to Leonardo’s 'Saper Vedere' philosophy, what is the most reliable source for a new invention?
Get it right to open this lesson and 74 more in the app.
Where Leonardo’s Machines takes you
Go beyond the sketches to master the engineering principles, mechanical logic, and visionary designs of history’s most famous polymath.
- 1
The Mind of the Inventor
- The Codex Method
- 2
The Grammar of Motion
- Transformation of Motion
- Friction and Lubrication
- Renaissance Power Sources
- 3
Conquest of the Air
- Ornithopters and Wing Mechanics
- Gliding and Aerodynamics
- 4
Engineering for the Battlefield
- Mobile Fortifications
- Ballistics and Projectiles
- Naval Warfare and Submersibles
- 5
Mastering the Elements: Water
- Hydraulic Lifting and Siphons
- Canalization and Lock Systems
- 6
The Built Environment
- The Ideal City
- Structural Innovations
- 7
Precision and Measurement
- Measuring Distance and Time
- Cartography as Engineering
- 8
Bio-Engineering and Automata
- The Robotic Knight
- Anatomical Basis for Design
- 9
From Paper to Reality
- The Limits of 15th Century Metallurgy
- Modern Reconstructions
9 sections · 19 units · 75 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
You pick the voice
Leonardo’s Machines is taught in the The Professor style: clear, structured, thorough. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start Leonardo’s Machines today.
Download Tomo, search Leonardo’s Machines, and play your first lesson in under a minute.