Deep in the Berkley Research Facility Labs in California, a team of audio experts and scientists have been working on a restoration project made with recording materials dating back to 1878.

The recording medium originally designed by Thomas Edison consists of a cylinder and some tin foil onto which the signal was scratched with a stylus.

This early technology was not designed for more than a couple of playbacks before it deteriorated, but the team have cunningly created a 3D computer model of the grooves then recreated the sound in software.

What did they find? Well I admit, its not the most spellbinding content, but a tune played on a horn, followed by a chap called Thomas Mason reciting  a couple of nursery rhymes.

Challenging stuff, whats your most ricky restoration job?

>>Recommended playback version:

Full length filtered playback of the tinfoil Tinfoil_filesfoil_top_ewc-DC-FIRFoil1CH.wav 

 The foil is easier to listen to if broken into distinct sections.  

The sections are from the filtered version.

Section 1: Quiet lead-in with only the sound of the folds (see image above) Tinfoil_filesLeadin-filter.wav

Section 2: Brass instruments Tinfoil_filesMusic-filter.wav

Section 3: Mary Had a Little Lamb Tinfoil_filesMary-filter.wav

Section 4: Laughter Tinfoil_filesLaugher-filter.wav

Section 5: Old Mother Hubbard Tinfoil_filesOld-Mother-Hubbard-filter.wav

Section 6: Laughter and more speaking Tinfoil_filesMore-laughter.wav

Full length raw playback of the tinfoil Tinfoil_filesfoil_top_ewc.wav

More Information

• http://websnap08.lbl.gov/Tinfoil.html

 

 

 

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