Culture

Images: The inner life of gadgets

Artist Satre Stuelke uses a CT scan machine to offer a penetrating take on objects from the iPhone and iPod to a vacuum tube and a wind-up rabbit.

Jon Skillings

Jon Skillings is an editorial director at CNET, where he's worked since 2000. A born browser of dictionaries, he honed his language skills as a US Army linguist (Polish and German) before diving into editing for tech publications -- including at PC Week and the IDG News Service -- back when the web was just getting under way, and even a little before. For CNET, he's written on topics from GPS, AI and 5G to James Bond, aircraft, astronauts, brass instruments and music streaming services.

See full bio

Jon Skillings

April 1, 2009 2:03 p.m. PT

1 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

DeLonghi toaster

Artists try to see beyond the obvious, to look into the deeper aspects of everyday objects. It was only a matter of time, then, until someone decided to use a CT scan to reveal the inner life of commonplace items from the iPod to the Barbie doll and from a toaster to the Big Mac.

The artist in this case is Satre Stuelke, who's also a medical student in New York. A wider selection of his CT scans (and QuickTime movies giving a 360-degree view) can be seen at the Web site for his Radiology Art project. This slideshow focuses on some of the technological and mechanical objects of "unique cultural importance in modern society" for which Stuelke aims to provide "deeper visualization."

Seen here is a DeLonghi toaster. Writes Stuelke slyly: "Despite scrutiny under this high-resolution CT scan, we were unable to pinpoint the cause of toast only getting crisp on one side of the bread."

2 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

Apple iBook

There's a lot to see under the hood of an Apple iBook laptop--batteries, disk drives, LCD panel. The CT scan also sees through the construction to the upside-down Apple logo on the far side of the casing.

The images come from an older four-slice CT scanner used for research and are processed in Osirix software on an iMac. Additional image processing takes place in Adobe Photoshop.

For a very different experience of examining the innards of an iBook, see "Photos: Cracking open the iBook G3."

3 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

Apple iPhone

Why so blue, iPhone? The Radiology Art site says that colors are determined by the density of the materials in the scanned object. The background color for the image--black or white--depends on the spread of the densities.

Stuelke told The New York Times that this iPhone "still works fine after that hefty dose of radiation."

4 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

Apple iPod

In the bottom half of this iPod image, you can make out the scroll wheel as well as some of the components behind it. At the top is the battery pack (in gray) and the headphone jack (in green).

5 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

Palm PDA

The Palm PDA depicted here is in a leather case that makes for a bright green border. Per the Radiology Art site: "Note the stylus stored alongside the body of the PDA on the right side. The expansion card can be seen in the upper left of the image as can the battery pack, which is slightly tilted and found toward the bottom of the image. The PC board and various components can be seen in purple. Finally, the quick-access buttons can be visualized along the bottom of the PDA body."

6 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

Motorola Razr

This flipped-open Motorola Razr is one jam-packed cell phone, from the vibrating motor at the bottom to the LCD panel at the top. This is one of the first such images that Stuelke made, according to The New York Times.

7 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

Norelco electric razor

Thin as a Razr might be, don't try shaving with it. For that aspect of personal grooming, you'd want a relatively ancient form of consumer electronics. This particular electric razor is from Norelco.

8 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

vacuum tube

In the middle of the 20th century, a key piece of electronic technology was the vacuum tube. This one is a Teslovak KT88S. According to the Web site for Penta Laboratories, the KT88S and other "totally new" vacuum tubes are "handmade in limited quantities...in the classic European tradition."

9 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

wind-up car

The Radiology Art site says of this wind-up pace car: "The driver is easily visualized behind the steering wheel. Perhaps the most interesting part of this image is the spring, whose loose coil can be seen directly to the right of the driver."

You can also make out the wind-up key to the left of the driver. From this perspective, the key looks like it's the steering column.

10 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

wind-up rabbit

"The internal mechanism" of this wind-up rabbit, according to Radiology Art, "is quite surprising in that it has a windmill-like cog wheel that controls the arm movement and also makes the bunny rock back and forth."

11 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

remote-controlled dog

This CT scan shows the operational part of a remote-controlled dog that walks, barks (opening its mouth), and wags its tail.

12 of 12 Courtesy of Satre Stuelke, Radiologyart.com

jiggly elephant

Pull the tail of this elephant to set it a-jiggling. "The eyes, spots, smile, and seams are all sewn with a heavy thread. The diffuse cloud-like contents is stuffing or 'fluff'," according to the Radiology Art site.