This summer we went to White Sands, which has an uncommon sand made of gypsum instead of silica. The crystal form of it is called selenite; when it’s threads are aligned and prismatic it’s called a satin spar.
Continuing on to Sedona, the crystal shops had some long “wands”; I got a 15" one that fits perfectly in front of a 128 x APA102 2020. I really like how it creates lines (does anyone know the name of this effect? I’d call it the polished steel elevator door effect). Without this or some other attenuation, it’s painful to look at directly.
Selenite was mentioned in the Hackaday LED Hack Chat a week ago, so I thought I’d film what it looks like on my desk.
That is exceptionally cool! Selenite has really strange refractive properties. I grew up near White Sands – still have a couple of big slabs from a dry lake bed outside the park, and some smaller lead/uranium contaminated specimens (they show bright, creepy yellow fluorescence under UV) from old diggings in the hills nearby.
that looks really cool! I’ve seen a ton of bottom lit selenite and I wonder why no one ever tried it sideways like this. Didn’t know it had those layers.
What’s the track btw?
