Water in suspended animation - kinetic sculpture

A friend called Lee Gamble on the same 'Sonic Art' course as me at uni had set up a little experimental kinetic sculpture, which he said he'd heard of being done by an artist in the sixties (I think)... it involves syphoning water through a tube which is connected to the cone of a loudspeaker. The loudspeaker is set to oscillate at a very low frequency (sub-audible, say around 10hz). Under normal light, that just looks like a fan of water coming down. Then, one has a strobe light (the kind one might normally associate more with raves than photography) going off at the same rate (or some harmonic). That is the only light source. The result is that the shape of the water is effectively visibly 'sampled' at the same phase of it's oscillation every time the strobe flashes. What this means is that, without cameras getting involved, one perceives a more-or-less stable wave of water droplets, suspended in the air - stability depending I guess on how rough the setup is (the setup here is very rough). Slightly altering the rate of either the signal going to the speaker, or the strobe, results in droplets appearing to slowly ascend or descend.

I later set up a similar thing again in my basement, and made this video of and about it. In order to video it, I had to tackle the issue of interference with the video framerate, essentially meaning that I had to tune the system to harmonics of 24hz and the video camera exposures to be long enough that they incorporated the flashes. I meant to explain the whole setup in the video. I don't know how clear it is as I didn't really plan what I was going to say and by the time I made it, I'd explained the basics to various friends several times shortly before - maybe I felt like everyone must understand that by then and the thing that was on my mind was how to make the video...

I hope you enjoy it, I can't take much credit.

/******
Still images at xinaesthetic.net/water_strobe
- maybe I'll redo these with a better camera one day -
******/

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• kinetic
• arts
• crafts
• beauty
• technology
• installation
• physics
• music
• experimental
• art

[irenelealortiz]

so you are trying to do an oscilloscope with water, a speaker and strobe light... right?? awesome!!!!

[xinaesthetic]

Something like that... although I don't think it would make a good general purpose oscilloscope, to say the least. It's a lot of fun to see droplets of water hanging in the air, though.

Try it :-)

[oid123]

Hmm, most interesting. I wonder how small this could be built. I'm guessing that higher frequencies would be a must.

Once I finish building my high frequency strobe (more like put it in an appropriate container) I think I'll try this.

[xinaesthetic]

Hmmm... getting the water to oscillate at higher frequencies might be a bit of a challenge. Let me know how you get on.

I think I saw something in 'related videos' at some point, a similar thing at MIT that looked quite small, fwiw...

[xinaesthetic]

hmmm, the more I think about it, the more I think my comment about strobes was pretty innapropriate, especially given that I was already something of a fan of Edgertons early motion studies and so on. Who'd have thought anyone would actually read that description? You live and learn, eh. ;)

[pxl8r]

I dont understand how strobe light is more associated with raves than photography? It was used as a flash decades before the first raves.

Interesting artistic experiment in resonance or just frequency waves... Here is the criticism bit: ...but at least through video it fails to make an impression, esthetic touch or poetic effect that a piece of art would in my opinion make. It seems to be a good start for a means to make one, though. Now seems like lofi mechanics experiment of sorts.

[xinaesthetic]

Wow, a comment! And a thoughtful one at that! Thanks.

Actually, I first wrote the description I put here as an explanation to someone from a photography forum; so I was trying to make the distinction that it was not the kind of strobe that synchs with a camera with precise settings etc.

Criticism gratefully received; this isn't my real real work, so to speak, but a phenomena I felt worth presenting - and I do call it a 'sketch' in the subtitles at the beginning for a reason.

[stiffyman]

where can i find an oscillating low frequency sound?

[umahuma4]

I think i just had an internal nose bleed, or a seizure,one of the two

[kettumikka]

I appreciate your work!