rose that drops its petals?!

[thiswayup]

I've been asked to look at making a rose for a production of "beauty and the beast" that drops its petals intermittently throughout one act. I'm hoping to set it on a pedestal to conceal workings beneath & have an idea involving small magnets and fishingwire - but I would like to avoid fishingwire if possible & was wondering if anyone else had done this prop before & what methods they used if so? There's a company called Codsteaks that I understand did one in London but I feel it's far too cheeky for me to ring & ask them how they did it, so if anyone has any info they could pass me I'd be grateful?!! Here's hoping!

[rudigure]

UK Productions are on tour with it at the moment and the company has a hire department, you could try them.

[Andrew Edwards]

I've seen one that used thin rigid wire down tubular stems. The petals were attached to the wire enough to hold but when the wire was pulled they came off the end and dropped. The mechanism was really simple and effective but needed to be operated from below as the wires fed down through the pedestal. According to the maker, the hardest part was making the petals rigid enough without looking too false. Bell jar cover was expensive too.

 

HTH

 

Drew.

 

 

 

A concurrent post has been automatically merged from this point on.

 

Just remembered it was not 100% accurate and sometimes dropped more than one. It was modified to make one of the petals hold really quite strongly so we always had the last one to drop for that all important scene.

 

Edit : grammar

[andy_s]

having tried (very unsuccesfully) a long time ago, to find or make electro magnets small enough to be installed in a convincing rose stem / leaf combination, I wish I'd thought of the hollow tube method suggested - it sounds a much more feasible solution to me. The Ladybird Book of Magnets was very helpful, but didn't actually tell me how to do Beauty and the Beast props....perhaps if I'd been reading the RS catalogue instead....

 

If I'd known better at the time, I'd have said "spend the money, commission a specialist props-maker", except of course the money was never there in the budget in the first place....

[thiswayup]

Thanks for these thoughts....I've done some more research on electromagnets/solenoids as I've heard that's how they did a very successful one in the US. Have found someone I know who is clever with electronic stuff for interactive exhibition models and knows his solenoids, so if the budget is confirmed big enough, we will go down that road...if not, it may be me trying out the wire in hollow stem idea - had also had some thoughts about trying camera shutter release cables...?! hmmm, still would welcome further thoughts! Thanks everyone.

[adam2]

I can think of a different approach that should be very controllable.

 

Attach to the rose branches a number of small resistors, painted as required to match the surroundings. Connect each resistor to its own circuit at some safe voltage such as 12 volts or less, useing of course, the thinest wire that you can get.

Attach each rose petal to a resistor with a small amount of candle wax.

When it is desired that the petals should drop, connect each circuit in turn to a small battery in order that the resistor will become hot, melting the wax and allowing the petal(s) to fall.

 

The connection could be made by hand by an operator, via a hidden length of multi core cable, and a set of push to make switchs, or if desired could be radio or even DMX controlled.

 

I would suggest 0.25 watt resistors ,180 ohms, and a 9 volt battery as a starting point.

 

Presuming that the battery gives 8 volts on load, then 180 ohms gives a current of 44 miliamps, which would give a power disipated in the resistor of 0.36 watts. (overloading the resistor is of no consequence as it is only briefly and in ventilated surroundings.)

[mr_cahonjes]

Did Beauty & The Beast in america two summers ago, rented set and all official Disney jazz.

 

the rose worked with pneumatic solenoids I think. The petals were "threaded" onto the two or three pneumatic solenoids for the number of times there was a petal drop and was just a matter of retracting the individual solenoid and the petal would drop.

 

Now this was all operated by the "driver" of the castle so no idea if this helpful for however big your show is or whether you can adapt this.

[thiswayup]

Did Beauty & The Beast in america two summers ago, rented set and all official Disney jazz.

 

the rose worked with pneumatic solenoids I think. The petals were "threaded" onto the two or three pneumatic solenoids for the number of times there was a petal drop and was just a matter of retracting the individual solenoid and the petal would drop.

 

Now this was all operated by the "driver" of the castle so no idea if this helpful for however big your show is or whether you can adapt this.

 

 

Thanks for that - that's pretty much how we're going to do it by the sounds of things - my electronics expert/associate has found tiny solenoids and we reckon we can disguise as many as 8 or 10 in the head of the rose and they can be triggered one by one by a handheld control in the wings. We've tried a test "petal" and it seems to work brilliantly, so fingers crossed!!

 

Now there's the question of finding a supplier for the acrylic/perspex dome, which seems to be an even bigger challenge!! Ideas welcome!

[Seano]

Now there's the question of finding a supplier for the acrylic/perspex dome, which seems to be an even bigger challenge!! Ideas welcome!

 

Here are a couple of suggestions from a 2 second Google:

http://www.ukplasticfabrication.co.uk/

http://www.talbotdesigns.co.uk/acrylic-plastic-domes.htm

 

Edit:

Or, thinking on, you might find a Victorian bell cloche will do. (Not hard to come by up to about 18" tall in garden centres and the like.)

[Paddywhack]

The cover off a dome clock might do the trick - if you can get hold of a cheap plastic one on e-bay or something.

 

Just a thought

 

N

[thiswayup]

Now there's the question of finding a supplier for the acrylic/perspex dome, which seems to be an even bigger challenge!! Ideas welcome!

 

Here are a couple of suggestions from a 2 second Google:

http://www.ukplasticfabrication.co.uk/

http://www.talbotdesigns.co.uk/acrylic-plastic-domes.htm

 

Edit:

Or, thinking on, you might find a Victorian bell cloche will do. (Not hard to come by up to about 18" tall in garden centres and the like.)

 

 

Had already tried those and many many more - the same answer everywhere; it seems tall acrylic domes are no longer made in this country. America has the same problem I've heard. We could get one made from a cylinder with a small hemisphere glued on top but that's about as close as we can get. More possibilities in glass (clock domes, belljars and glass cloches) but nothing the right size (500mm tall) and the director doesn't want glass on stage unfortunately. So we are stumped at the moment. Will keep an eye open for a 2nd hand acrylic dome but it doesn't look likely.....

[Jivemaster]

Dixon Glass in SE london supply bell jars but they are glass

 

http://www.dixonglass.co.uk/labor/glassframe06.html

 

ebay 360099491325

[Seano]

Dixon Glass in SE london supply bell jars but they are glass

http://www.dixonglass.co.uk/labor/glassframe06.html

 

They only seem to go to 350mm high anyway, plastic cloches are dead easy to find up to 360mm. (This kind of thing):

 

http://www.greenfingers.com/images/superstore/DS0018D_l.jpg

 

But it does look a lot harder to get any bigger than that.