Photographic Speed

Photography is a staple of the modern world and we can't go anywhere without seeing a picture these days. But not so long ago it was a much different story advertisements and fliers were all hand drawn or painted. It wasn't until very recently that camera technology started making actual strides. The first photographs required subjects to sit for long periods of time because the technology used required a longer exposure rate. This meant that people most likely didn't smile as it was hard to hold a pose for a long time and the photos were low quality. Fast forward to modern day now everyone has a state of the art camera on them at all times, the newest samsung comes equipped with a 16 megapixel camera. All a user needs to do now is point and shoot and they have a perfectly good crystal clear photo.

The photo of the nuclear bomb exploding was one of the photos that really caught my attention in the article. It demonstrates the capability of high speed cameras and also reveals something that a viewer would not have seen before. The photo shows the metamorphosis of the explosion, generally when we think nuke we think mushroom cloud but this photo shows something else entirely. It doesn't say this in the article but I remember watching a documentary about high speed recordings of the bombs. The purpose of  the high speed imagery was to help the engineers and physicists who designed the bomb to better understand what happened right after the blast. The high speed photography revealed the actual shape of the blast wave. This allowed the designers to create new models that unfortunately worked more efficiently, but nevertheless high speed photography allowed them to see more than the human eye could.