# A little clip of my new lights



## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

I wasn't sure where to post this, but I've been adding a light show to my little production company over the past six months or so and it's starting to take shape. 

This clip is just me running through a few scenes and washes. Unfortunately the house lights were still on which dramatically reduces the impact, but I think it's cool.

The LED technology is really cool (literally) in that it doesn't draw much current at all and also doesn't generate heat.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy64MmHHk2k


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## GuitarsCanada (Dec 30, 2005)

Some nice stuff there Mike. :rockon2:


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## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

Lookin' good....very good :bow:

Cheers

Dave


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

Thanks guys.

Actually the laser is really cool as well. It doesn't show up much in the clip, but with the house lights down and some fog it's a pretty strong effect.

I also have a nice Chauvet follow spot. Lights are sort of addictive



or maybe that's gear in general, LOL.


Anyway, I'm starting to get more comfortable with the DMX technology. I can easily create pretty much any any basic colour a band may request. It's a simple matter of mixing red, green and blue LEDs.

I had a group ask for pink (breast cancer benefit) and it was easy. Just start with a good dose of blue and add red until it turns pink. It's much more like painting than using an incandescant rig is if you know what I mean.


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## Mooh (Mar 7, 2007)

Very nice! Nice work Milkman. It's been years since I've been in a band with serious lights. These look great. Gets me to thinking...

Peace, Mooh.


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

Thanks Mooh,

You know I hate to turn this into a thead about how great things were in the olden days, but.....


There has been a complete colapse in the level of production most bands bring into your average mid sized bar.

In the 80s every band came in with a sound man. Most had a light man, and of course along with that was bigger gear, professional lighting, smoke, sometimes even pyro.

These days it's most often just four guys with their amps and drums blasting off the stage, nothing mic'd and nobody out front to mix.


It's just the way the market has gone and that is driven by the public I suppose, but the net result is that the audence is getting a watered down product.


Really it's a matter of what the bars will pay. It's as simple as that. 


Walk in with real production these days and people take notice.


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## Mooh (Mar 7, 2007)

Milkman said:


> Walk in with real production these days and people take notice.


Aye lad, 'tis true. Once a year I get to play a festival stage with pro light and sound (Steven Darke at the board). The difference is staggering.

Peace, Mooh.


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## ronmac (Sep 22, 2006)

That looks pretty good. 

I am looking at following your lead for my festival season next year. The sound side of my service is in a place where I am pretty happy with the product I have and the quality it can deliver. 

On the other hand, I have always resisted getting too deep into lighting. I'll probably go the LED route. It's petty hard to resist the flexibility it offers.


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

Mooh said:


> Aye lad, 'tis true. Once a year I get to play a festival stage with pro light and sound (Steven Darke at the board). The difference is staggering.
> 
> Peace, Mooh.


Yup, better for the band, better for the audience.


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

ronmac said:


> That looks pretty good.
> 
> I am looking at following your lead for my festival season next year. The sound side of my service is in a place where I am pretty happy with the product I have and the quality it can deliver.
> 
> On the other hand, I have always resisted getting too deep into lighting. I'll probably go the LED route. It's petty hard to resist the flexibility it offers.


The thing to understand about LED is that it does take more cans to equal the lumens you get with an incandescant rig. Having said that, unless you run your incandescants with every lamp on all the time that advantage is a wash.

I have 16 par 64s. Every single one can be set to any conceiveable colour and with the low current draw it's not a problem at all to run all 16 all the time.

Also with LEDs:

no dimmer packs to drag around
220 is not necessary
no heat
MUCH longer life
Much lighter
effects like strobing and colour cross fades
no additional lighting snake (run through one channel on your audio snake)


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## ronmac (Sep 22, 2006)

All good reasons to go in that direction.


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## kw_guitarguy (Apr 29, 2008)

Looks amazing Mike....I've done tons of sound, but never done lights. I have helped hang 'em, but never run them.

If you do any shows up my way, let me know...would love to have a look and help out!

~Andrew


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## Brennan (Apr 9, 2008)

Very cool. Can you give a rundown on the equipment you're using? 

My band has been discussing lighting quite a bit lately and we're looking into getting a decent LED setup to upgrade what we've currently got, but there's a massive amount of gear out there and most of the demos I've seen are done with DJing in mind (randomly lighting the audience and the room instead of a single focal point). I'm curious to hear what you're using, and what you think works/doesn't work.


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

kw_guitarguy said:


> Looks amazing Mike....I've done tons of sound, but never done lights. I have helped hang 'em, but never run them.
> 
> If you do any shows up my way, let me know...would love to have a look and help out!
> 
> ~Andrew



Thanks man,


I'm doing a ticketed event this Saturday evening in Cambridge. They've asked that I get up and play a few tunes. I'll have my daughter with me as well. Other than that I don't have anything booked in your area. 

Hmmmm. Whenever I get up to do tunes (not exactly something I like to do at a sound gig, but they insist and I don't want to offend them) I don't have anyone to mix for me. I can put your name on the guest list if you'll stand behind the board while I do six or seven tunes. 
kkjuw


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## james on bass (Feb 4, 2006)

That looks great. 

I agree with your comment, that production just ain't what it used to be.


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

Brennan said:


> Very cool. Can you give a rundown on the equipment you're using?
> 
> My band has been discussing lighting quite a bit lately and we're looking into getting a decent LED setup to upgrade what we've currently got, but there's a massive amount of gear out there and most of the demos I've seen are done with DJing in mind (randomly lighting the audience and the room instead of a single focal point). I'm curious to hear what you're using, and what you think works/doesn't work.




Well I bought what I call a basic infrastructure from a Brantford based internet company named MEC (Music Express Canada). Here's a link to their site.
http://musicexpresscanada.com/index.cfm?page=products&categoryId=3

That consists of sixteen aluminum Par 64 LED cans. If you look earlier in this thread you can see a picture. 

They're nice cans and the power of DMX programming and the ability to mix red, green and blue fundamental colours in each fixture makes them powerful and inspiring if that doesn't sound too over the top.

The board is a little no-name programmable Chinese desk with 12 chases and 16 channels. I will upgrade in the not too distant future. I'm able to do cool things but there are other things that I can't do and wish to heck I could.

Then I added 8 smaller LED cans which I mounted in two arrays of four lamps each. They're on universal aiming mounts so you can fan them out. Frankly they're not terribly impressive but they do light up a drum kit nicely.

I also purchased from MEC a nice motorized green laser. With smoke, it's a pretty wild effect.

I also have a Chauvet follow spot. It's also DMX if I want, but I run it stand alone. I may start using DMX with it when I'm on my own though. It would make a lot of sense.

Then I added a nice fog machine and grabbed the optional wireless remote for that which is a nice thing (no cabling to the stage except the audio snake).

That really makes the show in my opinion. The lights really come to life.

Then, knowing I needed more "specials" I tried a few different lights and finally selected a Chauvet Mega Moon. It was so effective I added another the following week.

Here's the link.
http://www.chauvetlighting.com/mega-moon.html

Of course I needed black aluminum Stands and T-bars for the Par 64's.

The video clip I posted earlier shows a little of what these can do. I'm just scratching the surface and even so I think they're pretty cool looking.


I believe that's it. Understanding DMX is the trick. There are lots of sites to help with that but it can be a little confusing until you get the hang of it.

Amazing what you can do. The nice thing is that the cabling seems for all the world to be XLR. They insist it's different but I use a few mic cables in the light rig. I don't have enough so called "DMX cables". They look a little cheaper than regular mic calbes but seem interchangeable.

I wanted the show to look rock and roll, not disco.


Any questions?


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## kw_guitarguy (Apr 29, 2008)

Mike,

Email me the info and throw me on the list, be happy to help out! I will come for setup etc...as well.

andrew @ atnet dot ca


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

ronmac said:


> That looks pretty good.
> 
> I am looking at following your lead for my festival season next year. The sound side of my service is in a place where I am pretty happy with the product I have and the quality it can deliver.
> 
> On the other hand, I have always resisted getting too deep into lighting. I'll probably go the LED route. It's petty hard to resist the flexibility it offers.


Would you mind telling me about your sound system please?


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## Brennan (Apr 9, 2008)

Thanks man, much appreciated. Those 64 par LED cans look like a great deal at 8 for 1099. We've already got a couple T-Bars with 8 par 38 cans on them (which I don't really care for, but they work), so those and a couple color bars would probably be a decent start.


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

Brennan said:


> Thanks man, much appreciated. Those 64 par LED cans look like a great deal at 8 for 1099. We've already got a couple T-Bars with 8 par 38 cans on them (which I don't really care for, but they work), so those and a couple color bars would probably be a decent start.


That's a great deal for sure. I' know that similar cans are selling for $250 each in stores. That's almost double the price of MEC.

There's one thing I'll warn you about. If you buy from MEC he'll try to sell you the cases that come with the lights. 8 lights will fit in each case and they're very nice cases on wheels. The only problem is that if you mount the cans on conventional T bars they won't fit in the cases. He has some on T-bars that WILL fit in the cases but in order to do so they're too close to each other and you can't aim them.

So that one thing I'm still working on is a way to safely pack and transport them in the trailer. I did buy one of his cases which I use to move the follow spot, rains, Mega moons, fog machine and light board, but the cans are banging around in the trailer. I need to improve that.


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## Milkman (Feb 2, 2006)

kw_guitarguy said:


> Mike,
> 
> Email me the info and throw me on the list, be happy to help out! I will come for setup etc...as well.
> 
> andrew @ atnet dot ca


E-mail sent. Thanks for the kind offer to help.

:food-smiley-004:


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