Monday, November 3, 2014

Lasers on Parade (no pics)

The Purple Wienie works on Auto if I whack it every so often.  For that much I'll let it hang on the rack for a while as I've taken it down and put it back up (sort of) already and that ain't happening again tonight.

Two green lasers are strong and the third is a Medium Wienie.  So that once shall henceforth be known as the Green Medium Wienie.

My Blue has got a clue
In fact, you might say,
he's burnin' hot today.
But my Purple was a wimp,
he's just a grass-eating dimp,
and he can't even play.
Ba doobie doobie

(I have no idea what a 'dimp' might be but I'm sure they would eat grass)


The blue laser is either 300 or 500 mW.  That's most likely from Chinavision as they have ridiculously ridiculous electronics there for ridiculously cheap prices ... but ... three to four weeks shipping.  I haven't dealt with them for ages but if I can hold up the hunger strike for long enough then I'll deal with them relatively soon as I want more lasers.   Ha!

The mW rating for the laser is only useful in comparison with other lasers of the same color and it's useless otherwise.  For example, a red laser at 100 mW will be fantastically bright whereas a 100 mW purple laser you probably wouldn't even see.  Greens don't require much either and the requirements for various colors will go up from there.

I have seen five-color lasers (i.e. five separate beams and not filter tricks) and those, presumably, must be fairly well-balanced for color or what point in putting them in the same unit.  That's some expensive kit as, even from China, you're probably talking $500 US or so.

As to which ones will hurt you ... well ... all of them.  If I were sensible, I would treat a pair of RayBans as kit and they're expensive enough to be ... but I want a fookin' red laser.  I'll think about it as I'm seeing trails all over the place from the experiments just now.  I think I will have to relent and be sensible but not if I can help it.

Some of you may remember trippin' trails.  Well, they never really stopped (laughs).


This video is not permitted to be half-ass, wimpy-ass or any kind of -ass, most emphatically not teary-ass.  If there are any kind of tears out of this, there will only be one kind of ass and it will be mine, severely-busted due to a justifiable case of whoop-ass.

The visual right now is extremely cool as there's a four-beam projection device that's not a laser and really only shoots polka dots but you don't care about the dots so much as the beam.  Each of the beams divides into multiple other beams so shoot it straight up.  Screw the dots on the wall, you just want the beams.  Blow smoke through them and the whole world changes color like it's the Wizard of Oz.

It's a similar thing with lasers as many of them are pre-programmed to draw various patterns on the wall.  I couldn't care less if the laser can draw a duck on the wall as all I want from it is the beam.  When you blow smoke through a moving laser beam, that's what gives the liquid light effect and, for me, that is absolutely gorgeous as it's art with a dynamic and it's not my art as it's the Necromancer's smoke, he decides where it goes ... I just look at it and go, wow, look the fuck at that.

I advised previously on using fog machines in ventilated areas and I'm sure you can easily guess this place is not ventilated ... but ... I'm using the fog very judiciously as there needs to be enough to show the beams but not so much that photography is impossible and / or that I cough myself into a box.  There's not much sensibility here but there is some.  I used only two or three two-second bursts and that was plenty.  That's a nice fogger and it's proven it after sitting there for years doing nothing and still it works.  If I used this thing with the windows open, they'd call the Fire Department for sure.  It's unbelievable how much smoke this thing can make.

The key to making this Madison Square Gardens is being able to change the light patch while I'm playing.  It's not terribly difficult to change the light controller if I have it in a good enough location but it's still requiring moving my hand away from the guitar while I'm playing it.  This situation is exactly why an onboard MIDI pad is interesting.  That's sky pie stuff as it's a lot of money and it would be dog slow to happen even if I had the jingle to do it.

For filming, an immediate concern with using auto-focus is that using smoke means it won't work ... how can it.  Therefore, a night is going to go finding exposure and focus that really nail the image. It's a trick as it would then blow focus if I move.  This will take a bit of experimenting.

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