Prop: Heartbeat on an oscilloscope

[NivagSwerdna]

I've been asked.... would it be possible to have an oscilloscope show a heartbeat so it could be used as a prop sitting in the background of a film (amateur!) scene...

This must have been done before... any pointers? 

Thanks in advance

PS
The signal can be pre-recorded... doesn't need attaching to anyone!  (Also... it can be repetative... no flat lining required!)

[themadhippy]

how about recording of a heartbeat  fed into the scope

[jpanhalt]

I used a MAX9814 breakout board that included an electret microphone (various sources, including Adafruit and DK) to record clock beats.  It also worked with my pulse.  For a recording, I just used my Rigol and a saved a screen to a thumb drive.  Background noise can be a problem but should be easy to clean up (attachment 2).

[Labrat101]

Us a cheap signal gen they have this function.   

[mc172]

I would use a computer with the scope connected to line out. You could simply draw the waveform you want in Audacity (free) with the pen tool and have it repeat the waveform indefinitely.

[Labrat101]

You can down load the pulse from YouTube . or similar for cheap results

[NivagSwerdna]

You could simply draw the waveform you want in Audacity (free) with the pen tool and have it repeat the waveform indefinitely.

That's interesting... wasn't aware of that function.  Thx

[msuthar]

HP function generator 33120A was able to output  a stored waveform of heart beat , if you can manage to get one unit then it is off the shelf wave form !

[xrunner]

You can down load the pulse from YouTube . or similar for cheap results

And when the patient is dead, well that's a built-in trace so no worries. 

[Labrat101]

You can down load the pulse from YouTube . or similar for cheap results

And when the patient is dead, well that's a built-in trace so no worries. 

If you had read the first Post  .. it's 4 a stage prop .. Not for the last post .. R.I.P   

[TimFox]

It's a common scene in film and TV to show the scope trace of an EKG that goes to flat line at death.

[mendip_discovery]

TV/Film tends to have a device, cover the screen in blue tape and then place the screen footage in post.

For your purpose, it might be easier to just use a raspberry pi, and an LCD screen in an old Scope box and just play a video and just time it right.

[SiliconWizard]

For people willing to have a more flexible solution, you can have a look at this: https://physionet.org/content/ecgsyn/1.0.0/

You can directly take the 'ecgsyn.dat' file (just a space-delimited CSV) in the 'sample-output' directory if you don't want/need to generate your own data.

You could play that back using a sound card, or using a small microcontroller.

[MarkL]

Not sure how fancy a scope you can get access to, but some scopes have have built-in waveform generators and "Cardiac" is a waveform choice.  You can put the scope in horizontal roll mode and it looks like a strip recorder.

An external monitor output on many scopes can get you a bigger display if it needs to be obvious.

Below is an Agilent MSO3000 series.  I'm sure similar functionality can be found on other make/models.

[DeanA]

Just get one of these https://theorycircuit.com/pulse-sensor-arduino/ and connect it to the scope with finger attached.