Guitar String Oscillations via iPhone
July 14, 2011 3:22 PM   Subscribe

Guitar String Oscillations via iPhone - your physics lesson for the day.
posted by Ardiril (15 comments total) 14 users marked this as a favorite
 


yeah, this is more a lesson in the weird things the iphone camera does rather than guitar strings.
posted by GuyZero at 3:27 PM on July 14, 2011


It's like a strobe light. It does demonstrate the wave in the string, but it's not exactly a standing wave or an accurate representation of the waveform, and it's definitely not slow motion, you could make the wave change shape or move backwards if you adjusted the refresh rate, probably.
posted by empath at 3:32 PM on July 14, 2011 [1 favorite]


wonder if the iphone could capture this. (1:20) {28 notes a second}

neat video and nice playing.
posted by clavdivs at 3:33 PM on July 14, 2011


Somewhat related previously.
posted by TedW at 3:40 PM on July 14, 2011


This is what vibrating guitar strings actually look like in slow motion.

Admittedly it's much less visually interesting, but is much more accurate. As you can see there is a very slight "wobble" to a guitar string when it's plucked away from the center, exactly in the same way you can induce a traveling wave in a taut rope or cable - but it's very subtle and doesn't look at all like the iPhone video. The bulk of the movement in the oscillation in a plucked string happens at the midpoint of the string, which is halfway the distance from where the string is being fingered on the frets and the frog at the base of the guitar.
posted by loquacious at 3:40 PM on July 14, 2011


Dammit people, stop getting physics in my pretend physics!
posted by 7segment at 3:51 PM on July 14, 2011 [4 favorites]


Too much Clapton
posted by nathancaswell at 3:53 PM on July 14, 2011


CLAPTON IS GOD
posted by Sphinx at 6:00 PM on July 14, 2011


So Blazecock, an image taken with an iPhone is really like a composite of many smaller individual frames?
posted by MattMangels at 9:51 PM on July 14, 2011


I guess so
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 9:59 PM on July 14, 2011


"Content is currently unavailable" (your FB link)
posted by MattMangels at 10:13 PM on July 14, 2011


Bowed violin string in slow motion This This movie shows the Helmholtz corner traveling back and forth along the string.


Why is the violin so hard to play?


Bows and strings
posted by Anything at 1:37 AM on July 15, 2011 [3 favorites]


Anything: that video is awesome. You can actually see the overtones!
posted by gjc at 5:22 AM on July 15, 2011


This is the image I tried to link to, MattMangels.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 3:00 PM on July 15, 2011


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