Chladni Figures

Watch Chladni Figures live in the browser

Twelve thousand grains of sand lie on a dim square plate. As the music plays, the sand is thrown off the moving parts of the plate and slides into thin lines, forming symmetric figures of crossings, rings and lattices that dissolve and re-form whenever the sound changes.

In 1787 Ernst Chladni showed such figures by bowing sand-covered metal plates: the sand collects on the nodal lines, where the plate stays still. Here sixteen vibration modes of a square plate are mixed, each driven by its own slice of the spectrum from low to high. A mode's weight depends on how far its band moves above or below its own recent average, so changes in the music, not loudness alone, decide the figure.

What it reacts to

• Spectrum changes: a band that rises or falls re-weights its plate mode, and the sand flows to a new figure
• Bass hits: push the mode weights harder and make the sand jump
• Loudness: the sand slides faster and the plate's rim brightens
• Silence: the sand rests where it is

Tune

Color sets the colour of the sand and the plate.

Music that suits it

Music that keeps changing in timbre and register, such as solo piano, jazz or experimental electronic music, keeps the figures re-forming; a steady drone lets one figure settle.

How to play it

Install Deus, play music on Spotify, YouTube Music, Yandex Music or any other tab and click the Deus icon on that tab. Then pick Chladni Figures in the Canvas presets, or press ← → on the page until it comes up.