Seeing the Unseen: Dr. Harold E. Edgerton and the Wonders of Strobe Alley - Tapa blanda

"Microscopic animals, whirring machine parts, deep sea life, atomic blasts, speeding bullets, the wings of a hummingbird--a near universal list of reality in motion as apprehended by the unique problem-solving and powerfully focused curiosity of Dr. Edgerton." --James L. Enyeart in his introduction to "Seeing the Unseen"

Harold "Doc" Edgerton's stop-action stroboscopic flash photographs - the spiked diadem of a milk-drop splash, the path of a bullet, a hummingbird's wings - are considered wonders of both art and science. For decades these amazing images poured out of MIT's "Strobe Alley", Doc's name for his lab rooms and the corridor into which so many of his experiments seemed to spill. Previous accounts of this work have focused on the artistic quality of these images. "Seeing the Unseen" differs in its dual focus on the life and the science of this teacher/entrepreneur whose native curiosity led him to fashion imaginative means of stopping time to investigate the details of natural phenomena. A biographical essay by Douglas Collins traces Edgerton's odyssey from Aurora, Nebraska to Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he taught several generations of engineers to think creatively and where he developed the tools that allowed him to capture high-speed photographic images. An essay by Joyce Bedi reviews the historical antecedents of Doc's innovative technology. Intermixed are technical sidebars that explain the tools and techniques of high-speed photography. The essays are accompanied by 143 illustrations from Edgerton's work. The book is accompanied by an "electronic gallery" - a Kodak Portfolio Photo CD with 122 additional images, selected primarily for their aesthetic appeal.