Show us your LIGHT SHOW!

[sKiZo]

As I've said time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time again, puzzled that there's not more of this sort of thing going around. Is it just me?

Seeing that all senses are related, makes sense to me that seeing would of course compliment hearing. I've been playing with lights since the dawn of music.

My current system uses a Pulsar controller running a custom program that drives six true color photo floods. I just added a couple scratch 'n dent Chauvet MiniStrip LED bars. Between them, it'll certainly fill up a room and add a whole bunch of punch to the audio.

Anyway - I'll show you mine if you show me yours!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mo-eELYfEKk

.

 

[RevMen]

Milkdrop on the HD TV will keep my eyes busy indefinitely. Advanced users know how to run Milkdrop in response to line in, so that vinyl can be used as the source.

 

[sKiZo]

Ya. I know milkdrops. Either use what's out there, or make your own. If you come up with something special, go ahead and submit it to the judges and see if they'll roll your stuff into one of their program packages. How's THAT for 15 seconds of fame?

Lots of good stuff out there that's sound active on the desktop. G-Force is another good one. Geiss also. I've got a 24" monitor for my HTPC sitting in the stereo cabinet, and I'll run that also when I'm pulling music from that.

Big difference between a monitor and filling an entire room with light tho. I find that the shadows moving about are just as entertaining as the lights themselves.

I know - milkdrops and a projector!

 

[noise gate]

That's really something wild you got goiing on there skizo. If I was 20,, maybe 30 years younger I'd be all over that.

When I was a wee lad I had speakers hooked up to an old RCA suitcase record player scattered all over a corner of the basement. For lights I had a few strings of chrismas lights, regular light bulbs painted various colors and a red cop light I swiped off our combine, and a Home made strobe I made form a box with a hole , an old slide projector and a fan motor....Scared the crap out of my dad.

Coincidentaly my plan for today was to install maybe 3 white hallogan mini spots in my listening space. Aparently I've mellowed with age.

If I can quote Fred Eaglesmith " You're spokin the horses, and your scarin' me".

 

[House de Kris]

Well, I'd like to see your light show, but my limited data bandwidth Internet plan prevents me from viewing YouTube. Here's a picture I've posted here before of my college system back in 1980. It had a six channel light show (low/mid/high for left and right) controlling 330 Christmas tree lights. It's really hard to see the lights in that photo with the light used to take the picture.

Before that, when I was in high school, I had a couple more triacs (one for each channel) set to only come on at the highest peaks and they controlled a couple 60W bulbs in gooseneck table lamps in the back corners aimed up at the ceiling. The intent was to simulate lightning flashes, but I found the bright flashes too much, and they didn't last long.

Oh yeah, I also had the Atari Video Music hooked to my TV. DEVO used this as a background for a couple of their old videos. I also had the predecessor to the Video Music called the Audio Kaleidoscope. Actually, still have both of those somewhere.

 

[RevMen]

Big difference between a monitor and filling an entire room with light tho.

OK, well how about covering my house and trees with lights?

http://youtu.be/-G1PBM_C5Z8

 

[sKiZo]

Well, I'd like to see your light show, but my limited data bandwidth Internet plan prevents me from viewing YouTube.

I posted up an animated gif a bit back that should work for ya. Not quite like the real thing, but it's got that in common with slow speed internet, right? PS ... do you still listen to monophonic wax cylinders too? <G>

I do feel your pain. I was dialup myself till a few months back. Running a 3G wireless now and never going back.

Here's what's going on in the back of the room ...

Funny you should mention a Devo light show ... I got one too!!

PS - I did the xmas light thing too. Amazing what you can do with a low tech approach. Rope lights, plasma balls, lava lamps, you name it. Still, all in all, 600 watts of true color photo floods and 500 super bright LEDs seem to have a whole bunch more pOp ...

 

[sKiZo]

Here's another one I did way back when.

Sorry I don't got a pic with it lit. I had rope lights strung on top of all the panel supports and photo floods set up criss-crossing in the middle. Those ran kind of hot, as in ... "you smell smoke? ... no, not that smoke ... the other smoke!" Added a couple small fans for cooling and circulation, and while I was at it, taped tinsel garlands to the ceiling that blew around and made for all kinds of interesting highlights.

Not sure if it was all that good, or whether it was the herbal expansion, but it certainly did the job.

I eventually converted a couple tree lamps (anybody remember those?) for sound active, put in some more floods, and put them in the back corners. Anybody wants to go cheap, you can still find those tree lights at the goodwill and hook them up to a couple Ramsey kit boards. They're spring loaded and just pressure fit between the ceiling and floor so they're fairly portable if the SO doesn't take a shine to them.

 

[whoaru99]

Is it just me?

Different strokes for different folks, I guess. I've gone the opposite by putting all of my blinky-light stuff at the back of the room where I don't normally see it in use.

Heck, unless I'm watching a movie/TV, I generally have my eyes closed when listening to music at my place.

 

[sKiZo]

I can close my eyes, put on a blindfold, and still see those Chauvet MiniStrips ... did I mention those suckers are BRIGHT! ? <G>

BTW - the idea for the limousine tinting on the lenses wasn't an original. First time I turned them on, and shortly after the spots went away and I could blink again, I searched the internet and found a few posts on it. For them, the things were too bright for their CLUBS!

They suggested one layer, I went with two of the DARK stuff. And rather than a permanent installation, the tint is just taped on at the ends. Perfect! Still a cartload of lumens, and doesn't seem to affect the blend at all. They're true RGB, so we're talking full spectrum.

And also, I can turn them off whenever I like. There's always that.

 

[sKiZo]

OK, well how about covering my house and trees with lights?

http://youtu.be/-G1PBM_C5Z8

My neighbors already hate you for this ...

http://youtu.be/9cEZvt8aB5I

 

[House de Kris]

I posted up an animated gif a bit back that should work for ya. Not quite like the real thing, but it's got that in common with slow speed internet, right? PS ... do you still listen to monophonic wax cylinders too? <G>

I do feel your pain. I was dialup myself till a few months back. Running a 3G wireless now and never going back.

Here's what's going on in the back of the room ...

Funny you should mention a Devo light show ... I got one too!!

PS - I did the xmas light thing too. Amazing what you can do with a low tech approach. Rope lights, plasma balls, lava lamps, you name it. Still, all in all, 600 watts of true color photo floods and 500 super bright LEDs seem to have a whole bunch more pOp ...

Thanks for posting the animated gif. I was actually curious enough to hike out to my front gate and use my phone to access YouTube. My phone has unlimited data, but I don't get a data signal at my house - only at my front gate about a quarter mile away. So, I did get to see your video.

I haven't upgraded to wax cylinders yet, I'm still using carrier pigeons to receive micro-sized piano rolls for my musical enjoyment here.

Tell me more about this Pulsar controller you've got. Is it synchronized with the music with an electrical path, or acoustic via microphone? I've got a plasma ball as well, but I really dislike its response to music. It gets smaller/dimmer when the audio gets louder. Just the opposite of how I would like things, so I turn the sensitivity knob all the way down to just have pretty blue/red lines move randomly around.

I also forgot to mention I have an Atari Virtual Light Machine as well. This is a little known hack for the CD option to the Jaguar game console. It makes video based on the audio of a CD you play in the drive. But, sound quality wise, it's not a very good CD player.

Really, though, the type of visuals I've evolved to take a bit more effort, but look pretty cool. Here's a link to a website I have where I have the videos from a number of past parties at: http://www.housedekris.com/catalog.html. None of the videos stream, so you have to download the whole thing to view it. The under construction website is convoluted, I admit, so if you are looking for a sample shortcut, try this. It is about 1.2G (as are most of the videos on that site) in size, so you'll get to exercise your 3G connection.

 

[Mark W.]

Mine is a little more subdued but here it is. Sorry about the sound took this during winter and the pellet stove was a little louder then I thought. So thats the underlying hum you hear. The red laser dancing on the face of the gear is mounted up above the rack pointing at a small convex mirror which spreads the beam and reflects it back at the gear. Plasma balls and airfresheners that change color are the rest. Not shown in this view are the dozen Lava type lamps that sit on top of the TV cabinet which is just to the left of this view.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHY6Cfbka7w

 

[sKiZo]

Tell me more about this Pulsar controller you've got. Is it synchronized with the music with an electrical path, or acoustic via microphone?

1.2 gigs ... uh, yeah. Here I'm worried that 20 megs is too much. <G>

I may have decent speed, but I'm on a 5gig a month budget, and I'm getting close as is. I'll bookmark for next month.

*******

The Pulsar is kinda neat. It has basic run/follow/chase capabilities as well as sound active modes. Also has a bass burst mode that sustains and pulses the blue lights for the duration of the beat. The fourth channel mixes the yellow and reds, which are also individually lit for pure notes. Pretty smart for an old timer. If I had a complaint, it's that it doesn't allow individual channel volume settings. And ya, it plugs right into the signal source - on mine, right into the headphone jack on the main amp.

PS ... those light files you have ... DMX stuff? I've been thinking about getting a smallish console and hooking that up to the Chauvet lites. Play around with some program specific ... er ... programming. Their Obey 4 looks like it has interesting possibilities. Inexpensive and compact - a good combination for playing about.

http://www.chauvetlighting.com/obey4.html

 

[sKiZo]

The red laser dancing on the face of the gear is mounted up above the rack pointing at a small convex mirror which spreads the beam and reflects it back at the gear.

First comment on your video ... "so wonderful vintage stuff and such a mess of annoying light crap around it, why?"

(hee hee)

Kewl. Does that laser get any bigger?

Thanx for the reminder. I went digging into the junk pile. Found my way out a half hour later with an old LaserFX unit that had crapped out some time back. Tore into it and found out the mirror (red arrow)had broken off the drive (which is basically two bare speaker coils with flexible arms that mount to the mirror) and a mini-color wheel (red arrow). The stepper motor on the wheel had also gone south, but it was just a loose wire.

Name is a bit misleading ... it's not a laser (it uses a neon strobe lamp), but it does shoot a fairly tight beam. Bright too - it'll do a full wall wash from about 10 feet back. It's also got a focus control so you can widen the beam to do color washes.

And I'll bet it's at least as loud as your pellet burner. Yet another excuse to

CRANK IT UP!!

I figure to let the glue set up on the mirror overnight anyway. I'll expect I'll post up a movie when I get it working.

 

[sKiZo]

Got the LaserFX fixed. Stepper motor had a loose connection and had to glue the mirror back on. Also adjusted the light source - lots brighter now. For what it is, it does a decent job now.

As promised ...

http://youtu.be/zP3c4N4hNdc

** I'm happy to report it's also a lot quieter now. I figure the mirror was loose for quite some time and just vibrated a whole bunch more than it was supposed to. You can barely hear it now. wOOt!

 

[Satcom123]

I don't have a light show to share but I like what I've seen so far. When I was stationed in Denver CO. We used to get wiped with weed and then enter the Denver Planetarium for their laser light and music show. We would lay on the floor because all the seats were full and get entertained for one hour with loud wonderful music with lasers displayed on the round ceiling. Pink Floyd and many others music would be played. Well worth the 5 bucks. Never seen anything like it since.

 

[sKiZo]

Laser light night at the local planetarium was a regular event for many years. Thanx for the reminder. I just checked the schedule. They're doing a lot of Christmas stuff right now ... ho ho hum ... but I see they've got Floyd, Zep, and Radiohead starting in January.

I like lights. One of these days, Still looking to add a few subtle effects ... like maybe throw this into the mix ...

 

[House de Kris]

1.2 gigs ... uh, yeah. Here I'm worried that 20 megs is too much. <G>

I may have decent speed, but I'm on a 5gig a month budget, and I'm getting close as is. I'll bookmark for next month.

*******

The Pulsar is kinda neat. It has basic run/follow/chase capabilities as well as sound active modes. Also has a bass burst mode that sustains and pulses the blue lights for the duration of the beat. The fourth channel mixes the yellow and reds, which are also individually lit for pure notes. Pretty smart for an old timer. If I had a complaint, it's that it doesn't allow individual channel volume settings. And ya, it plugs right into the signal source - on mine, right into the headphone jack on the main amp.

PS ... those light files you have ... DMX stuff? I've been thinking about getting a smallish console and hooking that up to the Chauvet lites. Play around with some program specific ... er ... programming. Their Obey 4 looks like it has interesting possibilities. Inexpensive and compact - a good combination for playing about.

http://www.chauvetlighting.com/obey4.html

Thanks for the Pulsar description. So, when the music stops, does the room go dark? Or, does Pulsar keep the chase going? Personally, I like it to go black when the music stops.

You guys have been reminding me of other lights I have, but have forgotten up til now. I had/have a NESS three-motor laser. It was really nice in that you could program a bunch of the presets and control it with a remote. Alas, I dropped it once and all it does now is rattle. So I got a couple cheaper American DJ mini-lasers. These are simple two-motor affairs with no programmability at all. I set them up to shoot to the same spot, from different angles, and have the patterns overlayed on each other. This makes the simple pattern of one much more complex and interesting to watch.

For my outdoor system, I have a couple light trees that have some effect lights on them. I have a couple of those Chauvet four color light bars which simply advance from one light to the other with the beat of the music. I have these aimed towards the speakers and they make the trees appear to dance a bit. I also have a couple fire effect lights (can't recall the maker right now). I got these because a friend of mine had water effect lights, and I figured fire would be a good complement.

The videos are what we used to do for parties. My friends would do the DJ task, and I'd do the VJ stuff. Since I'm working the video mixer, that's why I said it takes a bit more effort than just letting a box control some lights. So, it's not a video of lights, but rather is the video (and music) generated at the party. Each video is about two hours long, hence the 1.2G file size even with a very low bit-rate. These are H.264 files at about 1.5Mbps.

I was in the store the other day and saw the Obey 4. I think it would be cool to have that with a few of the LED lights also from Chauvet. I was actually at the store to look at their current LED light offerings. I use six LED light bars cycling slowly through colors right now as the room lighting. I was looking to get some effects, though. Pretty cool stuff.

 

[sKiZo]

Dancing trees!!

That's something people don't think about is how the lights interact with the environment. Heck, half the show in my music room is about the shadows. Black is a color too, right?

And yes, the Pulsar goes full black as the music fades. Great between tracks, but stunning during the playback too. Floyd's Machine is amazing - the blues pulse from full dark on the intro - adds a lot of impact when all hell breaks loose. Draws you right in for the sucker punch - BAM! Right between the eyes!

I just wish the Chauvet MiniStrips did the same in sound active. Can't imagine why not. I did email them about that, and the reply was "hey, great idea. We'll have to look into that." Sounded canned to me, but at least they answer their mail. You can program response based on db levels with the outboard controller, which is why I'm still considering the Obey4. That's a lot of tech for relatively small bucks.

PS - I got the ministrips from Musician's Friend. Scratch 'n dents - $75 for the pair. Both had minor cracks in the lenses. I got a cheepo poster frame at the local big box store and cut a couple new ones out of that.