Pendulum Waves

[HarveyDarkey]

[Scuba]

1. Farm out, man. Totally out of state.

[Wounded Bear]

2. Kewl! nt

[rrneck]

3. Strings 'n things.

http://brooklynmusiclessons.com/blog/guitar-string-oscillations

This intrepid guitarist put an iPhone inside his acoustic guitar to capture the string oscillations with amazing results. Below, I'll explain a little about what's happening, and also dig into some of the physical aspects of sound creation on the guitar. Pretty cool, right?

What's happening in the video is the result of an effect called rolling shutter. Basically, the sensor in the iPhone doesn't capture each frame of the video instantaneously, but rather scans in a "right to left" pattern. The strings are moving faster than the camera's image sensor can scan, so different sections of each string are captured at different points in motion, resulting in a waveform shape. (Whew! Still with me?)

While the waveforms in the video don't exactly represent what we might see on an oscilloscope, they do create an opportunity for us to explore some fundamental aspects of sound production.

[Suich]

4. That is awesomely cool!!!

[DamnYankeeInHouston]

5. Ultra cool. As always.