Pulsed LED Illuminator for Visualization, Recording and Measurements of High-Speed Events in Mechanics

Taking advantage of the rapid progress in light emitting diode (LED) technology observed in the last few years and of the availability of new high power devices emitting light of an unprecedented intensity, a single-LED high-power illuminator has been developed, designed and constructed. This apparatus can be run in continuous light mode (CW) or generate light pulses of user-programmable width and brightness. The pulse repetition rate can be freely chosen in the range from 0 to 1 MHz. The possible applications of the illuminator are high-speed videography in both front and back illumination modes, and several image-based measurement techniques. Initial experiments have shown that the high-power LED-illuminator becomes a versatile and competitive alternative to the laser and xenon based light sources.