Collecting & restoring mechanical calculators, slide rules and old electronic calcs. I sucked hard at math in school btw. Today I love it. Weird life, eh?

Caving (although not so much these days) and FPV drone flying

Large format film photography. It's a awesome hobby, although expensive, that requires a lot more indepth knowledge of the basics of photography to nail the shot. You can also get way better quality for way cheaper if you get the right films.

I play an Irish sport called hurling and I am neither Irish nor I am in Ireland. So nobody knows this sport so I have to explain a lot what it is. But it is so much fun!

Lockpicking. I’ve been a longtime watcher of content like the lockpicking lawyer so for Christmas I asked for a set of picks and tools from my wife. Ever since I just sit around and blindly fidget with old padlocks. You can get a decent starter set for $60 and a never ending supply of locks that have long since lost their keys.

I have a lot because ADHD hyperfixations. Here are some of the more niche ones:

SCUBA diving 3d printing Woodworking Finger drums Martial arts Power lifting FPV drone building and flying Board games and tabletop RPGs

I'm sure there are more, but these are the more recent ones that are really hard to get anyone to join other than my wife.

Quake Champions is an awesome PC shooter that almost no one has heard about. Has a small pro-league and everything

I do clothing embroidery with a machine. It's a small business, but I basically break even. It's a great way for me to have a creative outlet, and share the geek and outdoorsy designs with others that appreciate it. What I unintentionally have done is locked in what everyone I know gets for every Christmas gift for the foreseeable future.

-Making sprite art and turning it into perler/ the plastic bead things.

-Chiptune and synthesizers

-Tabletop RPGs

-Card games

I love the satisfaction of completing a film list like the AFI top 100 or Sight and Sound's top 100. I enjoy watching, discussing, and learning more about the films.

!simracing@lemmy.ml is one of my hobbies. I mod this community too! Join our hot lap challenge! :D

I have a very dangerous and lame hobby.

I forage for food. It's a lot of fun trying new things. But it's also really dangerous if you don't know what you are doing.

If you want to do this hobby safely start small. Identify plants in your own yard/park exct. I use an app called plant net, Wikipedia, duckduckgo, Google Earth, foraging sites, to find out where to go. Knowledge of when they grow and what condions they like helps.

Being 100% sure on what you are going to eat is a life and death choice. When in doubt, throw it out.

Feel free to ask me anything if you have questions.

Offroading in a full size vehicle. Most people on trails have moved to Side by Sides which takes half the fun out of wheeling. I prefer difficult technical trails where we are crawling along at 5-10mph.

The things is it's half the actual wheeling and half the building of the rig. There's nothing more satisfying than spending all week building something then having it work properly on the trail over the weekend

Not that niche, but tabletop role-playing games that are not Dungeons and Dragons!

Making custom home automations with Home Assistant. Sure, a lot of it is unnecessary but it sure is a lot of fun.

Not sure if it's niche anymore but mechanical keyboard is a fun rabbit hole to dive into. There's so much variety and diversity in term of customization. You can really build a keyboard that fit your preference in term of looks, feels and sounds. The hobby has been booming after covid so now you can get some really nice starter stuff at affordable price.

I was about to share some of mine but then comparing to everyone in the comments I realize mine are basic as hell

I'm a semi-secretive LARPer. I pack my stuff at night, don't talk to my coworkers about it, and just go about my life as if I don't.

I've found people are pretty judgy about it, so I just don't mention that I enjoy getting into a neat costume, playing some little mini-games, having a drink or six, camping, and (most importantly) seeing my friends once a month in a structured activity.

It's fun stuff if you find the right group. That last part is hard.

I revisited an old hobby, emulating niche systems. I got an Acorn emulator with Risc OS 5 and some development tools, and I wrote a snake game in BBC BASIC and a calculator in pure ARM assembly, both of which are new to me. It was a blast.

I play rhythm games. Like a lot. Maybe to many?

Painting miniatures, I'm new at this (less than one year) but I not so bad at this, and recently started to play street fighter 6 and really sucks buts is fun

Various degrees of niche-ness:

• modern boardgames. I've been fascinate by them since before I could write. I would draw my own roll and move boards and my mom would write down my instructions of what space would do what. From there it only grew and now I have more games I can play.
• rpgs. The most recent addition. I had always dismissed them as a potential hobby because it was advertised to me with videos of actors basically doing 99% improv and 1% gameplay. Turns out it doesn’t have to be like this.
• I also collect gemstones. Started as a kid when we came across an old quarz find on a hike. I was hooked by the shiny and have been collecting on and off ever since.

Longboarding is a hobby I picked up a few years ago and it’s a ton of fun. Just riding along you feel like you’re floating over the pavement and the feeling is addicting. You can get e-boards if you’re not into pushing but I haven’t gone down that road yet since they seem heavier and more expensive. Also, most of them you can’t push and you have to rely on your battery and motor so if you run out m, you’re stuck. Some companies like the one I bought my board from (Bustin) make hybrid boards but they’re pricey.