Elastic waves propagating in a cylindrical shell have been detected by an automated scanning laser vibrometer designed to record both in-plane and out-of-plane surface motion over the surface of the shell (32 points axially and 32 points circumferentially). The structure was freely suspended in air and excited radially by a shaker at a single frequency, either below or above the ring frequency of the shell. A wave vector analysis of the data was performed with a fast Fourier transform and an overdetermined modified extended Prony method. The results clearly show the presence of longitudinal, shear, and flexural waves above the ring frequency. In addition, the Prony method reveals the presence of evanescent waves due to mode conversion of the propagating waves near the ends of the shell. Below the ring frequency, two types of in-plane waves and flexural waves were identified. The results are in excellent agreement with predictions from the dispersion curves for thin shells.