Glass Breaking

Actual Elapsed Time: 1/10 of a second

A glass of water slips off the counter and breaks, sending water and glass all over the floor. What really happens is not that simple. Slowing down the action makes the event easier to see. The glass of water doesn't fall as a single unit, the water and the glass fall separately. The water flows out of the glass during the fall. The glass, on the other hand, bounces, hits the cabinet and then breaks into many pieces. The end result is more or less the same: both the water and glass end up all over the floor, but they get there in very different ways.

How This Clip Was Made:

This slow-motion video was created using a special video camera that takes 250 images a second, as opposed to only 30 images a second for a normal video camera. The video was then digitized and transferred to a computer. The action was slowed down even more by displaying each image twice. Production: Paul Shain, Bob Hone, Heidi Frieze. Post-Production: Brennan Doyle.

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