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Music created by $30,000 worth of Nikon SLRs

One photographer hatched a plan to make a symphony from a vast array of professional Nikon SLRs. The result can only be described as music to a camera geek's ears.

Lexy Savvides Principal Video Producer
Lexy is an on-air presenter and award-winning producer who covers consumer tech, including the latest smartphones, wearables and emerging trends like assistive robotics. She's won two Gold Telly Awards for her video series Beta Test. Prior to her career at CNET, she was a magazine editor, radio announcer and DJ. Lexy is based in San Francisco.
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Lexy Savvides
Sweet SLR music. Screenshot by CBSi

Benjamin Von Wong had a thought: what if he could turn a bevy of SLRs into sweet, sweet music? With the help of Nikon Professional Services (NPS) and composer Andrew Kesler, an estimated $30,000 worth of camera gear was used to create this song. Spotted by photography blog PetaPixel, 14 cameras went into the making of the "Nikon Symphony" across most of the Nikon range, from the D4 through to the D5200.

Sounds were created by playing with various functions of the camera. From Live View switching on and off to the mirror flipping up and down, even annoying camera beeps sound musical in this composition.

Photographers have long debated the pleasing nature of various SLR shutters, even creating comparison MP3s to work out the musicality of each. Hopefully, Von Wong's video will inspire fans of Canon, Sony, et al to put together their own compositions based on their machines.

You can watch the finished result below, and find out more about the recording process at Von Wong's website.