BLACKM UTH

The Apparatus

Three companion instruments.

Catalogued for those who require a means of listening, rather than only of reading.

Spirit Box

For the recovery of voices the room could not contain.

The first companion instrument. The device sweeps the audio band continuously and presents the listener with what is found between the stations. The voices, when they appear, are short, and they speak in the language of the listener.

Catalogued capabilities

  • Continuous sweep across the audio band
  • Question logged with timecode and location
  • Recordings retained on the device, never uploaded
Spirit Box on the App Store

The Veil

For the older traffic of question and answer.

The second companion instrument. The board, the pointer, and the convention of two hands resting upon it pre-date the instrument by more than a century. The threshold for opening a session is set, deliberately, slightly higher than the threshold for closing one.

Catalogued capabilities

  • Two-finger lift threshold to begin a session
  • Lettered field with planchette of recorded weight
  • Closing rite required before the session ends
The Veil on the App Store

Ghost Detector

For the disturbances that precede the visit.

The third companion instrument. The figures appear, in the older record, against a small disturbance of the room: a draft where there is no door, a needle that swings without provocation. The instrument records what the device can record. It does not interpret what it finds.

Catalogued capabilities

  • Field readings catalogued by location and time
  • Threshold alerts on departure from the local baseline
  • Session log exportable as plain text
Ghost Detector on the App Store