“Automatic Camera situated 7 miles from blast with 10 foot lens. Shutter speed equaled 1/1000,000,000 of-a-second exposure.” Early instances of an atomic explosion.

The photos are by Harold Edgerton aka “Papa Flash” who is famed for using Stroboscopic photography to photograph discrete instances of the everyday - balloons bursting, divers diving into pools, milk drops. These photos were taken using another of Edgerton’s inventions, the Rapatronic camera - capable of taking photographs with exposure times of 10 nanoseconds and are far from everday occurences.

In a micro-split of a split second, before the earth is scorched, what may be mistaken for a slightly sinister prop left over from Baron Munchhausens etc or a fantastic autonomous lunar pod dreamt up by Peter Cook is given life (like there was ever a city more instant than this).

Found at Digg + more images here.