In the 90s, and up until cell phone cameras were a big thing, I remember some family members having cameras with rather large flash modules on top and it would make a weird noise once the flash goes off after taking a picture. Some smaller flash capable cameras would make the sound also.
In: Technology
The whining noise?
The camera has a capacitor that stores energy for the flash, but it needs to be charged to much higher voltage than the battery produces. The sound is from the circuitry that increases the voltage to charge that capacitor. There are a few different ways moving electricity can cause sound, like magnetic forces as the amount of current in an inductor changes or from the piezoelectric effect as capacitors charge and discharge (not the one holding the charge for the flash, smaller ones that are charging and discharging repeatedly in the process of charging that one).
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