Post by thread:[OT:] Impressive lighting effects

'[OT:] Impressive lighting effects'

This must be what happens when an engineer has too much time on his hands.

http://members.cox.net/transam57/lights.wmv
> This must be what happens when an engineer has too

> much time on his hands

How do I get to be one of these mythical engineers with too

much time on his hands ? 8-))

Cool video, thanks. Incredible

> > This must be what happens when an engineer has too

> > much time on his hands

>

> How do I get to be one of these mythical engineers with too

> much time on his hands ? 8-))

Simple really, divorce the wife, abandon the kids, move away from your

parents/siblings/friends, quit your job, turn off you phones, unplug the

internet connection, etc, etc.

You'll definitely have more free time, no grantees you'll enjoy it though.

Of course that assumes you've already figured out how to become an engineer

:-)

-Denny

> Of course that assumes you've already figured out how to become an

engineer

Hey, once upon a time I couldn't even spell engineer - now I are one

Jinx wrote:

>>Of course that assumes you've already figured out how to become an

> 

> engineer

> 

> Hey, once upon a time I couldn't even spell engineer - now I are one

> 

You worked for the railway too?

;)

Maybe it would be better to do these kind of works as a profession...

Here is the link,

http://www.elementlabs.com/news/2005_February_RoundPixels.htm

Watch the demo...

 > Lindy:

 > Was the music original, do you think?  I didn't recognize it at all.

 > I'm curious, on a high level, how'd he do that?

This thing has become like spam, here are "facts" what I sent to my 

relatives who ALL sent it to me claiming it was their house.

:)

also check christmas lights threadpiclist november

D

......snip.......

OK , here are some more details of your  setup :

..................

in case you missed it:

video

http://members.cox.net/transam57/lights.wmv

http://www.snopes.com/photos/arts/xmaslights.asp

www.wonderlandchristmas.com/wizardsofwinter.php

.....

.... snip ....

This is definitely not a hoax. This guy lives about 3 miles from where I

work. We were up near there at lunch today so decided to stop by and

check it out. He had taken the day off of work and was out front working

on his holiday setup for this year. They guy was way cool and even took

us into his garage to see all the software and hardware that runs the

show. One of my co-workers lives in the same neighborhood and is going

to spend some more time over there to learn about getting started on a

smaller scale. And believe it or not, he does the whole show with a 40

amp service.

Final cool thing is that the Trans-Siberian Orchestra called him

yesterday and offered him free tickets to their next show in Cincinnati

with backstage passes and everything. How's that for quick fame?

....

Responding to #46: That's the guy and you can find his address easily if

you do a bit of detective work (took me 10 seconds). He was a bit

distraught that his old address and his correct phone number were posted

on the internet.

Correction: His is no longer using Light-O-Rama controllers though he

was in that particular video. He still uses their software, but the

solid state relay boards are custom pieces done for him by his

electrical engineer brother-in-law. Each board will handle 96 circuits

and offers ramped dimming effects that the original L-O-R boards did

not. He broadcasts on FM 96.9 using a cheapy FM PCI card with a wire

antenna hanging out of the back of the PC. I wish I had had my camera

along last week so you could see how this thing's wired. The effect is

very, very cool but his "behind the scenes" stuff is a bit chaotic. :-)

......

Dave Lag wrote:

> He still uses their software, but the

> solid state relay boards are custom pieces done for him by his

> electrical engineer brother-in-law. Each board will handle 96 circuits

> and offers ramped dimming effects that the original L-O-R boards did

> not.

I'm happy to have guessed that the boards he used in that video did not 

do dimming, and that he used a radio to transmit the audio.  :)

I've got a more modest, non-musical display on my house this year.  A 

mere 16 channels of dimmable lights is all I could build in time, but 16 

extension cords hanging out of my garage door is enough for this year. 

Next year I plan on building custom TRIAC boards that are better (read: 

probably safer) than simpleio.com's 4-triac board, where they pay great 

attention to keeping the AC lines apart from one another, but the trace 

widths are too small, and the designer didn't seem to care about keeping 

the low-voltage opto lines out from between(!) the high-voltage opto pins.

--Michael

...Oh, and Jinx:

Your "sheep on Crack" made it to the main news last night.

The anchor messed up the story preceeding he was so tickled- fell apart 

actually- stuff for the blooper shows.

On Dec 14, 2005, at 5:45 AM, Dave Lag wrote:

> I wish I had had my camera

> along last week so you could see how this thing's wired.

Is there a better quality video somewhere?

> Final cool thing is that the Trans-Siberian Orchestra called him

> yesterday and offered him free tickets to their next show in Cincinnati

> with backstage passes and everything. How's that for quick fame?

That's hardly "fame", but IS cool and rather appropriate...

Christmas lights are way up there on the "random acts of kindness and

senseless beauty" scale (mostly the latter, of course.)

BillW

William Chops Westfield wrote:

> Christmas lights are way up there on the "random acts of kindness and

> senseless beauty" scale (mostly the latter, of course.)

> 

> BillW

I was going to scale back myself this year,( nothing to speak of - half 

dozen rope lights, snowmen, trees) considering electricity prices etc...

Then the elderly neighbors just gushed about the lights in conversation

recently and ya know, it IS christmas, PC notwithstanding.

turn 'em on a little later, off a little earlier...

Besides, I look like Santa anyways and wouldn't want to taint his 

reputation...

Dave Lag wrote:

> I was going to scale back myself this year,( nothing to speak of - half 

> dozen rope lights, snowmen, trees) considering electricity prices etc...

That's one nice thing about dimmable lights.  I can have the same number 

of lights installed, but if I just use full-on for effects, and use 

half- or even quarter-brightness for most strings, I have a well-lit 

house that costs much less to run.

BTW, I noticed LED bulbs, which I bought several strings of, flicker.  I 

wonder if that is because they only use half the sine wave and I'm 

seeing the 50% duty cycle or if they full-wave rectify and i'm seeing 

the 120 Hz zero-crossings...

--Michael

> BTW, I noticed LED bulbs, which I bought several strings of, flicker.  I

> wonder if that is because they only use half the sine wave and I'm

> seeing the 50% duty cycle or if they full-wave rectify and i'm seeing

> the 120 Hz zero-crossings...

I'm guessing half-wave rectification is the problem, since 30 Hz might

be in the visible flicker range for a human, but 60 and above isn't likely

to.

Mike H.

>-----Original Message-----

>From: spam_OUTpiclist-bouncesTakeThisOuTmit.edu [.....piclist-bouncesKILLspam@spam@mit.edu] 

>Sent: 14 December 2005 19:08

>To: Microcontroller discussion list - Public.

>Subject: Re: [OT:] Impressive lighting effects

>

>

>> BTW, I noticed LED bulbs, which I bought several strings of, 

>flicker.  

>> I wonder if that is because they only use half the sine wave and I'm 

>> seeing the 50% duty cycle or if they full-wave rectify and 

>i'm seeing 

>> the 120 Hz zero-crossings...

>

>I'm guessing half-wave rectification is the problem, since 30 

>Hz might be in the visible flicker range for a human, but 60 

>and above isn't likely to.

>

>Mike H.

Another problem with LED's is that they don't have the thermal "inertia" of incandescent lamps which carry on glowing to some extent in between cycles.  An incandescent lamp on half wave rectifed supply might produce some noticeable flicker, but LED's will be far worse.

Regards

Mike

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This is a joke, right?

Half-waved rectified 60Hz AC is still 60Hz!

Or did I miss the boat somewhere... ?

Rolf

Mike Hord wrote:

{Quote hidden}>> BTW, I noticed LED bulbs, which I bought several strings of, flicker.  I

>> wonder if that is because they only use half the sine wave and I'm

>> seeing the 50% duty cycle or if they full-wave rectify and i'm seeing

>> the 120 Hz zero-crossings...

>>     

>

> I'm guessing half-wave rectification is the problem, since 30 Hz might

> be in the visible flicker range for a human, but 60 and above isn't likely

> to.

>

> Mike H.

>

>   

I also have some free time...

How did he sincronised music with lights?

The only way I can think of is that the song is not continous. The computer

plays a segment of music and displays the light fx. Then it plays the next

segment of music and so on.

Juan Cubillo

----- Original Message -----

From: "Denny Esterline" <firmwareKILLspamtds.net>

To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <.....piclistKILLspam.....mit.edu>

Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2005 2:43 AM

Subject: [OT:] Impressive lighting effects

This must be what happens when an engineer has too much time on his hands.

http://members.cox.net/transam57/lights.wm
> This is a joke, right?

>

> Half-waved rectified 60Hz AC is still 60Hz!

>

> Or did I miss the boat somewhere... ?

I think you missed a boat.  If you half-wave rectify 60 Hz

AC, you'll end up with only the positive parts of the sine

wave.  Full-wave rectified AC is 1/60th of a second from

one peak to the next, while half-wave rectified AC is

1/30th of a second from one peak to the next.  Or, to

put it another way, how many positive peaks are there,

per second, in a 60 Hz sine wave?

Mike H.

...Or, to

> put it another way, how many positive peaks are there,

> per second, in a 60 Hz sine wave?

>

60

RP

>> Half-waved rectified 60Hz AC is still 60Hz!

>>

>> Or did I miss the boat somewhere... ?

> 

> I think you missed a boat. 

IIRC full-rectifying is one of the tricks HF guys use to double a

frequency? (of course a LOT of filtering is involved to get something

that resembles a sine)

Wouter van Ooijen

-- -------------------------------------------

Van Ooijen Technische Informatica: http://www.voti.nl

consultancy, development, PICmicro products

docent Hogeschool van Utrecht: http://www.voti.nl/hvu

On 12/14/05, Richard Prosser <EraseMErhprosserspam_OUTTakeThisOuTgmail.com> wrote:

> ...Or, to

> > put it another way, how many positive peaks are there,

> > per second, in a 60 Hz sine wave?

> >

>

> 60

Duh.  Yes.  And I'm a jackass.

Yes, a half-wave rectified 60 Hz sine wave is still 60 Hz.

I should have stayed on the boat.

Mike H.

> >> Half-waved rectified 60Hz AC is still 60Hz!

> >>

> >> Or did I miss the boat somewhere... ?

> >

> > I think you missed a boat.

>

> IIRC full-rectifying is one of the tricks HF guys use to double a

> frequency? (of course a LOT of filtering is involved to get something

> that resembles a sine)

Yes, yes, I know.  Bad afternoon.  Let the mockery begin. ;-)

I was having a flashback to an argument I had with a non-engineer

about frequency content of a square wave.  He had a hard time

understanding why a 25% duty cycle 50 Hz square and a 50%

duty cycle 100 Hz square wave would result in different outputs

when going through the same filter- say, a 50 Hz low pass filter.

I think it was difficult for him because the shape of the pulse was

the same, and he had a difficult time understanding that the

overall waveform was still different.

Mike H.

As noted the music was Trans Siberian Orchestra.  In addition to the

commercial controller and software this gentleman used there is free

software and hardware (well the schematic is free) that uses the parallel

printer output of a PC to control up to 1024 outputs.  The hardware can be

found at http://www.ComputerChristmas.com and the software can be downloaded from

http://home.houston.rr.com/dman776/. 

Looking toward next year (although the wife has given me 2 years),

David

David V. Fansler

S/V Annabelle

Davidspam_OUTDV-Fansler.com

http://www.DV-Fansler.com

http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist

Mike Hord wrote:

> I think you missed a boat.

No, you did.  I can't believe people are having a problem with such a simple

and basic concept.

> If you half-wave rectify 60 Hz

> AC, you'll end up with only the positive parts of the sine

> wave.

OK so far.

> Full-wave rectified AC is 1/60th of a second from

> one peak to the next,

No.  Draw it on a piece of paper if that helps.

> while half-wave rectified AC is

> 1/30th of a second from one peak to the next.

Absolutely not.

> Or, to

> put it another way, how many positive peaks are there,

> per second, in a 60 Hz sine wave?

60.  *Think* about it.

******************************************************************

Embed Inc, Littleton Massachusetts, (978) 742-9014.  #1 PIC

consultant in 2004 program year.  http://www.embedinc.com/products

A Canadian effort.

http://www.lightup.ca

M Graff wrote:

{Quote hidden}> Dave Lag wrote:

> 

>> He still uses their software, but the

>> solid state relay boards are custom pieces done for him by his

>> electrical engineer brother-in-law. Each board will handle 96 circuits

>> and offers ramped dimming effects that the original L-O-R boards did

>> not.

> 

> 

> I'm happy to have guessed that the boards he used in that video did not 

> do dimming, and that he used a radio to transmit the audio.  :)

> 

> I've got a more modest, non-musical display on my house this year.  A 

> mere 16 channels of dimmable lights is all I could build in time, but 16 

> extension cords hanging out of my garage door is enough for this year. 

> Next year I plan on building custom TRIAC boards that are better (read: 

> probably safer) than simpleio.com's 4-triac board, where they pay great 

> attention to keeping the AC lines apart from one another, but the trace 

> widths are too small, and the designer didn't seem to care about keeping 

> the low-voltage opto lines out from between(!) the high-voltage opto pins.

> 

> --Michael

On Dec 14, 2005, at 12:42 PM, Juan Cubillo wrote:

> How did he sincronised music with lights?

>

There are several standardized protocols for synchronizing assorted

thingees with a musical score, used in everything from planetariums

to rock concerts to fireworks shows.  The simplest form is probably

the synchronized cassette/filmstrip projector that dates back at

least 30 years, where you put your audio on one track of a stereo

cassette and info to advance the film on the other track...

It would be EASIER to do this with a digital system; you're playing

back at 44k samples per second; it'd be trivial to run a parallel

data track at 4.4k bytes per second (for instance), letting you

trigger something every tenth of a second or so...

BillW

On 12/14/05, Olin Lathrop <@spam@olin_piclistKILLspamembedinc.com> wrote:

> Mike Hord wrote:

> > Or, to

> > put it another way, how many positive peaks are there,

> > per second, in a 60 Hz sine wave?

>

> 60.  *Think* about it.

Olin-

See my other previous sheepish responses, and thanks for not

giving me the whupping I so richly deserve for spilling such an

elementary error on 2000 cringing observers.

Mike H.

> It would be EASIER to do this with a digital system....

If one were sufficiently motivated, I'm sure the various models for

generating exciting visual stimulation associated with music which

have become standard in audio players these days could be

adapted for this sort of control.

It probably wouldn't be quite so aesthetically pleasing, though.

Mike H.

Keep the dog so you will be thought of as exocentric instead of crazy.

Pookie,  the dog.

----- Original Message ----- 

From: "Denny Esterline" <KILLspamfirmwareKILLspamtds.net>

To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <RemoveMEpiclistTakeThisOuTmit.edu>

Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2005 1:57 AM

Subject: Re: [OT:] Impressive lighting effects

{Quote hidden}>> > This must be what happens when an engineer has too

>> > much time on his hands

>>

>> How do I get to be one of these mythical engineers with too

>> much time on his hands ? 8-))

>

> Simple really, divorce the wife, abandon the kids, move away from your

> parents/siblings/friends, quit your job, turn off you phones, unplug the

> internet connection, etc, etc.

>

> You'll definitely have more free time, no grantees you'll enjoy it though.

>

> Of course that assumes you've already figured out how to become an 

> engineer

> :-)

>

> -Denny

>

> --
Le 16 Décembre 2005 05:25, Bill & Pookie a écrit :

> Keep the dog so you will be thought of as exocentric instead of crazy.

In my neighborhood, the craziest people all have (noisy) dogs.

>> How do I get to be one of these mythical engineers with too

>> much time on his hands ? 8-))

> ...

> > Simple really, divorce the wife, abandon the kids, move away from your

> > parents/siblings/friends, quit your job, turn off you phones, unplug

> > the internet connection, etc, etc.

My solution was: keep the wife, don't keep animals, don't make kids, avoid people, be self-employed, live on a extremely tight budget without a dept problem, don't use the phone, keep the Internet, have wet dreams about a "naked DSL", don't have a car.

> > You'll definitely have more free time, no grantees you'll enjoy it

> > though.

"I'm Not Dead Yet... I Feel Happy! I Feel Happy!"

> > Of course that assumes you've already figured out how to become an

> > engineer

Existential mood swings is  the precise reason why engineers needs more time. The "way to engineering" is their therapy.

--

Marc