

Photographer captures electricity - prat
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/12/pl_arts_sugimoto/all/1

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jacquesm
Pretty sparks!

As a kid I got my hands on a HV transformer from a rooftop light installation.

Two pieces of curved wires attached to the terminals, touch the base between
the wires with a hammer and a spark would ride up the curve.

As soon as the spark extinguished that would temporarily excite the coil to an
even higher voltage because of the circuit breaking, if you set it up just so
that would be enough to jump the gap between the two wires at the bottom and
the cycle would repeat.

Friggin' dangerous but lots of fun.

~~~
jazzychad
Sounds like a Jacob's Ladder or some variant thereof.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qh-Tt09IC8M>

My grandfather built one in his basement. It zapped him once and sent him
clear across the room.

~~~
theblackbox
Ha, that reminded me of one of my heros: Michio Kaku. He built a particle
accelerator in his basement when he was a teenager and wiped out every
transformer in his neighbourhood! Another amazingly reckless Japanese guy who
inspires from the danger of the edge (he now builds infinite improbability
drives for the galactic elite).

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tomkinstinch
For more information, this Wikipedia page is helpful:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lichtenberg_figure>

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RevRal
Again with those confounded fractals.

It's crazy how organic and of the natural world these look.

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kuda
I'd like to thank the submitter for linking to the article where the entire
gallery was on one page instead of ten.

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kingkongreveng_
I couldn't figure out what exactly he did from the article. Set black and
white photo paper on top a metal table and fire up a van de graaff?

