Vinyl Put Under Microscope In Slow Motion Video
Just this day I wondered how vinyl disc works. Here’s Applied Science YouTube channel showing it in extreme closeup. Ben Krasnow likes showing the sciency stuff that he can do at his home shop. His latest project saw him buy a vinyl record to put under electron microscope. Now you can see how the needle slides over the record at 1/400 speed.
The footage of the needle running through the grooves was made by saving microscope images in an oscilloscope one at a time, and then using Photoshop to make a gif.
Ben Krasnow now works at Google. His previous credits include Valve and making keyboards, mice, and joysticks for use in MRI machines. Krasnow’s YouTube channel presents a new project every Tuesday. They’re all really interesting, since Krasnow wants to do projects that seem very hard or impossible to do in a home workshop.
A still shot of the needle running down the groves.
Long-play LPs have stereographic sound capability, which is why the groves are two-sided.
The entire record is too big for the microscope, so small pieces were cut out.
A lengthy process was used to prepare cut-outs of vinyl that would fit in the microscope.
The needle itself had to be carefully prepared.
The entire assembly:
The video was made from sixty electron microscope shots like these.
The brave oscilloscope that recorded microscope shots unto a USB stick.
Got wisdom to pour?