Heather,
I once recorded my own heartbeat by just pressing a good condenser mic
against my chest. It was a reasonable (but not great) recording. The
biggest difficulties were ambient noise and handling noise. In
particular, it was difficult to hold the mic in place without creating
a lot of noise due to rubbing between the mic, my hands and my chest. I
controlled ambient noise by recording in the middle of the night, and I
controlled handling noise by being very careful.
If I wanted to put more effort into it, I would fashion a sort of
stethoscope by cutting a hole in the bottom of a plastic cup just big
enough for the mic to go through. Perhaps I would also wrap the cup/mic
assembly with a towel or something to mitigate noise.
Ed
P.S. Just another thought: I wouldn't be greatly surprised if the
cardiologist also has means to record the sound.
On Jun 9, 2007, at 2:07 PM, Heather Perkins wrote:
> Hello, all -
>
> Maybe this is not technically a question about nature recording, but
> it does involve the preservation of an interior soundscape, and I'd
> love to tap into the wisdom of this list...
>
> I need to record a heartbeat. A friend of mine is having open-heart
> surgery to repair a faulty valve, and she wants a recording of her
> murmuring heart before the surgery changes it.
>
> I can't throw money at the problem, so ingenuity will be key. I have
> a cheap lavalier, some home-made contact mics, an SM-58, some cheap
> dynamics, and a couple of nice condenser mics. I can probably lay my
> hands on a stethoscope.
>
> Any ideas?
>
> Let me know - and thanks!
>
> Heather Perkins
> Sound Designer - Composer - Mad Scientist
> WaterDog Studio & Land-O-Newts! Records
>
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> "While a picture is worth a thousand words, a
> sound is worth a thousand pictures." R. Murray Schafer via Bernie
> Krause
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