Color schlieren methods in shock wave research

Schlieren methods are widely known and well established to visualize refractive index variations in transparent media. The use of color allows one to obtain more data and previously inaccessible information from a picture taken with this technique. In general, a hue can be related to a certain strength or a certain direction of a refractive index gradient. While the first case essentially corresponds to the usual black- and-white system the latter correlation cannot be made adequately evident without the use of color. Two color schlieren techniques are presented here, which reach or even exceed the quality and sensitivity range of conventional black- and-white methods. Using a powerful short duration light source these methods are applied to visualize transient flow phenomena in a shock tube.