Milk Drop Coronet
Photographer: Harold Edgerton
Date: 1957
Location: MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
Harold 'Doc' Edgerton, an electrical engineering professor at MIT, pioneered the use of electronic stroboscope flash photography to capture events occurring too quickly for the human eye to see. His 'Milk Drop Coronet' photograph — capturing a single drop of milk striking a surface and creating a perfect, symmetrical crown-shaped splash — is one of his most iconic images, made using a strobe flashing at thousands of times per second to freeze the motion. Edgerton invented the modern electronic stroboscope in the 1930s and used it to create extraordinary high-speed photographs of bullets in flight, playing cards being cut by bullets, and athletes in motion. His techniques revolutionized scientific photography and influenced both science and fine art photography. He also developed underwater strobe equipment used by Jacques Cousteau, helping enable the age of underwater documentary filmmaking.
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