Open Circuits: The Inner Beauty of Electronic Components

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Our phones, computers, and appliances are made of hundreds of internal components, each precisely engineered to perform a certain function, but none intended to actually be seen. Through painstakingly executed, vividly detailed cross-section photography, Open Circuits reveals the surprising--and often accidental--beauty hiding inside the electronic components that drive our everyday devices. WinCo: worker-owned grocery chain that pays benefits, pensions, living wages — and has lower prices than WalMart https://business.time.com/2013/08/07/meet-the-low-key-low-cost-grocery-chain-being-called-wal-marts-worst-nightmare/ Karl Schroeder’s “The Million”: a science fiction conspiracy novel of radically altered timescales https://memex.craphound.com/2018/08/14/karl-schroeders-the-million-a-science-fiction-conspiracy-novel-of-radically-altered-timescales/

I did. The book is Open Circuits: The Inner Beauty of Electronic Components, by Windell Oskay and Eric Schlaepfer, and it is a drop-dead gorgeous collection of photos of electronic components, painstakingly cross-sectioned and polished: Qanon “codes” are consistent with an English-speaker mashing a QWERTY keyboard https://www.vice.com/en/article/9km87z/qanon-codes-are-random-typing In case you're wondering if it's really possible to craft a malicious USB cable that injects badware into your computer and is visually indistinguishable from a regular cable, the answer is a resounding yes, and of course, Hak5 sells those cables, with a variety of USB tips:) Open Circuits is a photographic exploration of the surprisingly beautiful design waiting to be discovered inside everyday electronic devices. Through painstakingly prepared cross-sections and stunningly vivid close-up images, the book reveals a hidden world full of elegance, subtle complexity, and wonder. From simple resistors and capacitors, to cutting-edge circuit boards and retro Nixie tubes, the authors’ arresting imagery transforms more than 130 electronic components into awe-inspiring works of art that will delight engineers, artists, designers, and photography enthusiasts alike.

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Moral Hazard, a short story for MIT Tech Review's 12 Tomorrows. FIRST DRAFT COMPLETE, ACCEPTED FOR PUBLICATION Stunningly beautiful . . . While the component images stand alone as works of art, authors Schlaepfer and Oskay pair the pictures with clear and informative text that adds to the reader's knowledge of the circuitry they are looking at. This book is sure to be a staple in many makers, educators, and engineers libraries." Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming/recent appearances, current writing projects, current reading Even without these risks, the photography itself posed a technical challenge. "One of the basic limitations that you can run into with macro photography is the limited depth of field – only a very narrow slice of the view is in focus at any given time," Windell explains.

I’m very pleased to announce my forthcoming new book, Open Circuits: The Inner Beauty of Electronic Components, co-written with Eric Schlaepfer. To rescue journalism, journalists must collaborate to defend free expression, not merely condemning Trump https://dangillmor.medium.com/dear-journalists-the-war-on-what-you-do-is-escalating-eb584529a271 None of the Above won the 2016 election https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2018/08/09/new-data-makes-it-clear-nonvoters-handed-trump-the-presidency/ The authors have done an outstanding job in etching and cleaning up the components, allowing readers to see the intricate details of each component in high-quality photos. In case you’re wondering if it’s really possible to craft a malicious USB cable that injects badware into your computer and is visually indistinguishable from a regular cable, the answer is a resounding yes, and of course, Hak5 sells those cables, with a variety of USB tips:)This is a visually stunning and highly informative book on the inner workings of electronic components.

This book is a work of art in its own right, offering readers a close-up look at the intricate details of various circuit boards and components, including a detailed cross-section of popular electronic components. EU resolution aims to comprehensively limit “planned obsolescence” https://www.retaildetail.eu/news/electronics/eu-aims-abolish-planned-obsolescence/ What an awesome book! A rare breed of technical content that is appreciable by experts and novices alike."

Eric Schlaepfer was trying to fix a broken piece of test equipment when he came across the cause of the problem—a troubled tantalum capacitor. The component had somehow shorted out, and he wanted to know why. So he polished it down for a look inside. He never found the source of the short, but he and his collaborator, Windell H. Oskay, discovered something even better: a breathtaking hidden world inside electronics. What followed were hours and hours of polishing, cleaning, and photography that resulted in Open Circuits: The Inner Beauty of Electronic Components (No Starch Press, 2022), an excerpt of which follows. As the authors write, everything about these components is deliberately designed to meet specific technical needs, but that design leads to “accidental beauty: the emergent aesthetics of things you were never expected to see.” Notes on using a single-person Mastodon server https://jvns.ca/blog/2023/08/11/some-notes-on-mastodon/ (h/t Nelson Minar) The platforms control our public discourse, and who they disconnect is arbitrary and capricious https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/beware-the-digital-censor/2018/08/12/997e28ea-9cd0-11e8-843b-36e177f3081c_story.html Our phones, computers, and appliances are made of hundreds of internal components, each precisely engineered to perform a certain function, but none intended to actually be seen. Through painstakingly executed, vividly detailed cross-section photography, Open Circuits reveals the surprising—and often accidental—beauty hiding inside the electronic components that drive our everyday devices. Aside from the impressive precision of these components (though there are exceptions, a particularly poorly made coax cable is roasted by the authors) the photography is really notable for bringing out glorious color in these components - sometimes included for manufacturing reasons, sometimes an artifact of the materials themselves - but normally not seen by human eyes at all, safely enclosed in plastic, ceramic, or metal boxes.