Camera captures light at 1 trillion frames per second

[Koko Ricky]

This is a wet dream for nerds like myself, who are fascinated by quantum mechanics, particle physics, light photons, and of course videography. A special apparatus has successfully captured light at such a slow speed that you can literally see the light wave (as often illustrated in books and computer simulations) as it slowly travels to its source.

Here's an apple being lit at said framerate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RbLLYCiyGE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fSqFWcb4rE&feature=related
Same procedure, but with a bottle.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqexQSao94k&feature=related
And the explanation of how it was done.

[Technician]

Ah, I'm not even excited...

[eargosedown]

^ Internet makes us all jaded, I think.


That's pretty cool though.

[Koko Ricky]

I love how in contrast to what is to me, one of those most exciting things I've ever witnessed on video, we get comments like "Ah, I'm not even excited..." Oh well, to each his own. I personally cannot stop talking/thinking about this.

[Technician]

GoatLord said:

I love how in contrast to what is to me, one of those most exciting things I've ever witnessed on video, we get comments like "Ah, I'm not even excited..." Oh well, to each his own. I personally cannot stop talking/thinking about this.

It's great to see actual light reflecting/refracting off objects, but it can be simulated so precisely with digital light sources that my amazement is all but nil.

[HavoX]

GoatLord said:

Here's an apple being lit at said framerate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RbLLYCiyGE

That's a tomato, not an apple; and a tomato is NOT a fruit.

[Ralphis]

HavoX said:

That's a tomato, not an apple; and a tomato is NOT a fruit.

I think it is technically classified as a fruit, actually

[andthe]

This proves intelligent design and the consciousness of light.

[Gez]

Technician said:

It's great to see actual light reflecting/refracting off objects, but it can be simulated so precisely with digital light sources that my amazement is all but nil.

Having models and simulations is fine. Having a visible proof that reality does indeed behave like theory is a different kettle of fish.

HavoX said:

That's a tomato, not an apple; and a tomato is NOT a fruit.

You fail botany forever. Fruit belongs to the vocabulary of biology, vegetable to that of cooking. It's perfectly possible for something to be both a fruit and a vegetable. A tomato isn't a root, nor a bulb, nor a leaf, nor a stalk, nor a tuber or whatever; it's the plant's seed-bearing structure and that categorizes it as a fruit. (More specifically, a berry. Speaking of which, blackberries and strawberries aren't berries. Blueberries are, though -- and so are bananas.)

[Bucket]

It's hard to be impressed because I don't really know what I'm looking at here.

[dew]

the footage itself is mehhh, because it's not that much different from previous fast camera movies... but once you start reading about the technology behind it, you go woah. the setup is ridiculous and kind of... vernesque.

[HavoX]

Gez said:

Fruit belongs to the vocabulary of biology, vegetable to that of cooking. It's perfectly possible for something to be both a fruit and a vegetable. A tomato isn't a root, nor a bulb, nor a leaf, nor a stalk, nor a tuber or whatever; it's the plant's seed-bearing structure and that categorizes it as a fruit. (More specifically, a berry. Speaking of which, blackberries and strawberries aren't berries. Blueberries are, though -- and so are bananas.)

All good points.

[Doom_Dude]

I wouldn't say I was excited but it was pretty interesting watching light travel towards and over an object in slow mo. Now that it's all over I'm bored. :p

[Maes]

fruit and related existential/semantic problems

In Soviet Doomworld, fruit pick YOU! Especially if it's of the false kind.

[CODOR]

Very neat, although my first thought was "how can the Mythbusters use this to explode stuff?"

[Csonicgo]

andthe said:

This proves intelligent design and the consciousness of light.

Soon, we'll be training light to play in chess matches.

[Captain Red]

Technician said:

It's great to see actual light reflecting/refracting off objects, but it can be simulated so precisely with digital light sources that my amazement is all but nil.

Have Some Meaningless Bullshit:

[Epyo]

pretty cool idea! but we're not actually watching light move

[Koko Ricky]

Epyo said:

pretty cool idea! but we're not actually watching light move

Those don't appear to be packets of photons hitting a surface? What is it, then?

[GreyGhost]

They're packets of reflected photons hitting the camera. </pedantry>

[Xaser]

For all who didn't watch the explanation video, what's happening (in a Xaser-paraphrased sort of way) is that they're pulsing a laser and taking tiny fragments of images at much coarser time intervals and stitching them together. The effect is that of a trillion-FPS video, though it's not of the same single pulse of light. ;)

So this technology is impressive, but has its limitations, like the fact that the 'scene' has to be completely stationary throughout the whole imaging process. Definitely cool to watch, for sure.

[Csonicgo]

GreyGhost said:

They're packets of reflected photons hitting the camera. </pedantry>

Bingo.

If anyone knows about how light "works" (according to theory) then the result is that every lighted surface is from the light waves including the light reaching the camera. this is the whole "we are a particle and a wave" part of it. in a way you can think of a photon as a particle spitting light waves everywhere.

[boris]

HavoX said:

That's a tomato, not an apple; and a tomato is NOT a fruit.

[Epyo]

I was thinking what xaser said but csonicgo's point is also nice

crazy impressive stuff though