Hi,

I'm working on a piece for which I need to record the sounds of a rock splitting and cracking. I'm going to be using a quarrying composite which is filled into pre-drilled holes and which, when mixed with water, expands with huge amounts of pressure, breaking the rock open from the inside. This process takes around an hour. Cracks start to open up and the rock will eventually fall apart.

However, I also want to capture any minute movements/noises that may prefigure the more dramatic/obvious splits. Any thoughts on how I could do this? I would suppose contact microphones, but must admit I don't know much about sound recording. I know geologists record extremely subtle earth movements and tectonic shifts but couldn't find much technical information on how this is done.

Any help would be very much appreciated,

Thanks in advance,

Phil