Body Vibration

Understanding the movement of the main resonating surface of an instrument, in the case of a guitar, its top-plate, is essential in understanding the instrument's ability to propagate sound at all frequencies. Viewing the frequencies at which the modes occur helps explain the timbre of the acoustical characteristics of the instrument. A scanning-point vibrometer, for example by Polytec, measures the movement of a surface and gives its users three-dimensional software views of its structural motion.