Person, Places Photo Essay

For a few years in my past I had the great joy and privilege to work in the anechoic chamber of BYU. Being an audiophile, this naturally appeals to the geekier side of me. In this chamber that was specially commissioned for the University, it is so quiet that you can literally hear your heartbeat as well as the rush of blood pulsing through your veins.

The truly soundproof room.

There are complex foundations at work here -- perhaps a metaphor?

You cannot hear someone speaking if they are facing away from you or behind you. Everything in this room is either to absorb or deflect sound using awesomeness.

Within this room many high-profile experiments are conducted utilizing many extraordinarily expensive microphones.

You are suspended roughly 20 feet in the air on a large suspension lattice that can support a large amount of weight, all in the attempt to isolate and then diffuse the sounds within the room.

The effort of this room is complete isolation and silence. It even has its own foundation. Much in the same way, I have come to feel that we, too must have a place of solitude, but still firm in a foundation to move among others. Life can be hard, but beautiful if we so let it.