15,000 Volts Courses Through Plywood, Revealing “Lightning Made from Molasses”

“When light­ning flash­es across the sky, you only get a chance to glimpse its frac­tal form for a split sec­ond. But when you send 15,000 volts cours­ing through ply­wood, you get a much bet­ter look at how it grows. Melanie Hoff, a stu­dent at the Pratt Insti­tute in New York City did just that, and the result is a time­lapse where you can see the pat­terns slow­ly grow out and smol­der, like light­ning made from molasses.”

That’s the descrip­tion that intro­duces the 15,000 Volts video on YouTube. On her own Vimeo Chan­nel, Hoff adds a few more details about what you’re see­ing above, say­ing “Yes, the grain of the wood influ­ences the pat­tern and the direc­tion [it takes]. The lay­ers of veneer and the glue that holds them togeth­er caus­es the growth to progress much slow­er than in non-ply­wood. This is sped up hun­dreds of thou­sands of times” in the time­lapse film. The musi­cal accom­pa­ni­ment is “Aire De Zam­ba,” by Augustin Bar­rios Man­gore.

via Giz­mo­do

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