Increase Your Christmas Cheer with This Slow-Motion Glitter Explosion Video

Christmas can be a tough time of year. Gift-shopping, family get-together, and cold weather can leave you feeling a little exhausted. Luckily the team at the Hydraulic Press Channel have cooked up a way to brighten your Christmas cheer. By using their infamous press to crush a mountain of glitter and a CO2 cartridge. As you can imagine the results are spectacular. And in slow motion, it looks even better. This is guaranteed to cheer you up, just a little bit. 

While the glitter is mood-enhancing for us, it isn't such good news for the planet. In fact, scientists have called for a ban on the so-called unicorn dust. Senior lecturer in environment and planning at Massey University in New Zealand, Trisia Farrelly believes we need to ban glitter now in order to protect our ocean future. Glitter is made of a polymer called Mylar and is technically designated as a microplastic. Researchers estimate that there are more than 5.25 trillion pieces of plastic drifting in waters across the globe and microplastics account for 92.4% of this plastic waste. Microplastics are the most difficult ocean pollution to clean up because of their size. This same small size makes them look the most food like particle to marine life. The consumption of microplastics is obviously a death sentence for most animals. But don’t panic, there are environmentally options out there. Manufacturers are using a variety of different materials to create ‘green’ glitter including eucalyptus extract.