Seismology came along hands in hand with development of seismographs. A seismograph with smoked paper drum recording was actually used till 1993. These days, you can hardly find engineer who knows how to exchange the recording paper and is rarely seen. Here’s the whole process demonstrated by eng. Atsushi Watanabe in our Technical Division, in the sooting room remaining in the basement floor of the Earthquake Research Institute (ERI), The University of Tokyo.
“Seismograph with smoked paper drum recording” is updated on our Youtube ERI channel