I Love My Clipboard

Posted on April 11, 2008 by swansont

I got a fluorescent clipboard a while back. I love the effect.

The edge is much, much brighter than the rest, though it’s a little easier to see this in person. The clipboard is acting as a waveguide for the emitted fluorescence; any light emitted within the total internal reflectance angle is being transported to the edge, and any light entering through the edge is likewise guided. Except for the places where there is clear tape (holding a Dilbert cartoon on a transparency) where you can see some of the light coupling out through the tape, because the light isn’t totally contained in a waveguide. There is an evanescent wave that can couple to a material of a different index, resulting in frustrated total internal reflection.

The Ralph Mellish Effect

Posted on March 30, 2008 by swansont

Scarcely able to believe his eyes, Ralph Mellish looked down. But one glance confirmed his suspicions. Behind a bush, on the side of the road, there was *no* severed arm. No dismembered trunk of a man in his late fifties. No head in a bag. Nothing. Not a sausage.

And now for something completely different: a water balloon not exploding in high-speed

via Talk Like a Physicist

Now Robots Have Gone to the Dogs

Posted on March 28, 2008 by swansont

It took me more than a few seconds to be convinced that it wasn’t just two people with a box over their torsos.

Big Dog

Much less time to figure this one out

(’twas the feet that gave it away)

Hat tip to Patrick

Staring Up … at My Computer Monitor

Posted on March 18, 2008 by swansont

Google Sky

Much like Google Maps in that there are areas that are not mapped in great detail, and others where you can zoom all the way in (it shouldn’t be all that hard to guess that this correlates with interesting features in the night sky). No “street view” feature, yet.

via The Quantum Pontiff

Your Data Are Colorful and Sound Funky

Posted on March 16, 2008 by swansont

Cryogenic dark matter search (CDMS) signals converted into visual and audio

(OK, who didn’t have one of these in their dorm rooms in college? 🙂 )

There’s a pepsi-through-the-nose funny part, too, (at least according to my calibrations) about halfway through. What a dark sense of humor!

From the Fermilab newsletter, via physics and physicists

More Illusions

Posted on March 7, 2008 by swansont

For a peek at a few more illusions, of the “interchanging 2-D and 3-D” variety, as well as some history & physics behind it all, head on over to Skulls in the Stars.