New Mic Proof of Concept

[AntiProtonBoy]

What kind of frequency response do you get out of this? A Bode plot of this thing would be interesting to see.

[imon2nd]

@AntiProtonBoy

Frequency response is reasonably flat out to 6K Hz, then falls. Changing physical parameters moved the response out to higher frequencies, but then we lost the low end. I think we can design a version of this that will be flat 20 to 20K. The big issue is dealing with the noise floor. We have to add DSP to handle that. I proposed an AES paper about the performance of the prototypes for the Fall 2010 conference . The paper was not accepted.

[Derelictos]

i have an idea for a microphone how about we use a living tissue dog ear diaphram and the entire inner ear and pull the electron signals from that instead

[Derelictos]

i have an idea for a microphone how about we use a living tissue dog ear diaphram and the entire inner ear and pull the electron signals from that instead

[Derelictos]

reflect the laser off of a very light weight gold leaf diafram and then you will have more pronounced reflection movements

[evpdave]

Interesting microphone design, I hope it is a success for you. It reminds me a great deal of the research of Erland Babcock in the mid eighties, when he worked for Metasciences. I developed a massless microphone design in 2004, it uses heat generated by a flame. If interested search my vid for 'Optical Microphone Test by request'.

[imon2nd]

Thanks, Dave.

Babcock may be one of the patents I referenced.

I'll take a look at your videos and comment over there.

Best Regards,

David

[deezynar]

Great idea! Will you be able to reuse the smoke? If not, what will you do with the surplus?

Do you think you'll ever be able to make a handheld mic that uses this technology?

FYI, I saw the link to this video on GlobalSpec.

[imon2nd]

Thanks, Dee.

Yes, the smoke or fog can be recirculated.

Prototype 6, which we are working on now, will use water vapor, so we aren't concerned about reuse.

If we stay with water vapor and don't save the condensate, a handheld mic becomes very possible. Users might have to refill it with water every 100 hours or thereabouts.

Best Regards,

David

[deezynar]

Thanks, David,

I look forward to seeing your innovation enter the market. I'm sure it will become the new standard.

[edenflux]

your smoke looks too thin and takes away from your headroom.

use pot smoke.

it is thicker and less dynamics.

(it may be joke, but it may work...)

[imon2nd]

You have a valid point, Eden.

The more reflective or absorbent the smoke, the greater the scattering or attenuation effect.

Obviously, we can't use pot smoke, but there are better materials than we are currently using.

Cheers,

Dave

[joelito101]

I can see an improvement, what about using water as the traveling medium.

Or what about using something more solid like a gel.

Or how about a very thin fiber optic that vibrates with the sound.

[imon2nd]

Hello, joelito.

Water won't work because it can't be compressed, so the waves don't change the water's density enough to detect. Gel that has zero elasticity would be hard to find, so it will reverberate. If it were entirely plastic, the pressure waves would deform the gel and it would cease to respond. Vibrating anything is equivalent to having a diaphragm, which is what we've eliminated in the first place. The reasons for smoke are its low mass and ease of refresh.

Thanks,

Dave

[joelito101]

the refresh explanation did it for me, thank you.

[imon2nd]

Thanks, Zurdo.

I hope you can get a commercial version of this mic to record music within a year.

Best Regards,

Dave

[zurdokmexico]

grandioso, me gustaria empezar a grabar musica con esto.