High-Speed Motion Pictures with Synchronized Multiflash Lighting

Abstract

Equipment to synchronize a high-intensity flashlamp with a high-speed motion picture camera has been designed and built. The camera was a 16-mm, rotating-prism type and synchronization was accomplished by a brush-type contactor built into the camera. The electrical signal from the contactor was sent through a pulse-forming circuit to a trigger tube in the flashlamp circuit. The film speed was 1800 frames per second and the duration of each flash was about one microsecond. Resolving-power tests made by photographing a one-foot disk revolving at 1500 revolutions per minute showed the marked superiority of flash-lighting over continuous light at these speeds. The resolving power measured for a rapidly moving object was doubled by the use of multiflash lighting, and, even in the case of a stationary object, a 25 per cent increase was obtained.