Another day at Everwonder Labs...

[mixedgas]

Ever wonder if all those spirograph and lissajous patterns have names...

Why yes of course, they are all ratios of amplitude and frequency.. Any anyone who has played with a Pangolin or Similar abstract generator knows what Uncle Ivan's ilk called "Innies" and "Outies", but did you know about "Eggs","Shells", "Figure Eights", "wings", "The Arrow of Time", Chaladni Patterns, Resonance Figures, "Encircled Hearts" etc,

Pay 12.00$ at Borders for ISBN 0-8027-1409-9 Title:

Harmonograph, A Visual Guide to the Mathematics of Music".

Not really a math book, but a pleasent read on the history of the patterns many of us love so well, and easy ways to remember how to create a given figure.

I hate to break it to you, but these patterns have been around since the 1500s or so.. Most done in sand of all things at first. Includes some rather fascinating history.

Well worth two or three days lunch money, kiddies... 58 pages, and includes plans for some hardware you can build with simple tools...

Beautiful pictures, made long ago before the idea of lasers, but you may like the late 1800s galvos... Um, uses no electricity, so maybe galvanometric is not quite the right term.

Be the first to know what I'm talking about when I say a countercurrent Fifth, which you'd call a 3:2 ratio star. Many of these terms are well known to musical types...

Get this book, a true laserist would not be dissapointed.

Steve

[blowfly]

Sounds like a cool book. I love this kind of stuff.

Thanks Steve,
Mike

[300EVIL]

Very interesting. Thanks Steve.

[buffo]

Just ordered it off Amazon. $9.60 with free super-saver shipping if you order $25 or more. Should be here next week!

Adam

[Doc]

I've been interested in the musical aspect for years.

I find it fascinating the way various superimposed harmonics in a sign wave can induce a feeling of love and happiness and a different set of harmonics can induce serious distress and fear (think diminished 5th minor chords).

In fact there are chords that induce just about every emotion a human can feel (6th major/minor 7th etc etc etc), and the spooky thing is that this effect is the same for people that hear music for the very first time, so we can eliminate nurture as the reason.

All of this just because of the mathematical relationship between oscillations.

[mixedgas]

Minor fifths, major sixths, and sevenths are much of what the book is about.

:-)

Steve

[shrad]

musically and optically speaking, it is very interesting

bought one and will study it thoroughly

[dave321]

hi,
that is a gem of a little book, great find
as i believe bill (benner) said in a previous post elsewhere, its not the frequencies chosen but the ratios to each other that determines the patterns.

i was so impressed, i just bought a spirograph on e-bay lol

dave321