billy bobinski Posted August 18, 2009 Share Posted August 18, 2009 Hi All, Many moons ago I remember we used to use a 'cracked oil' substance which was placed in a frying pan and put on top of a small electrical hob to produce a haze for the beams to show up. On larger stages there were 3 or 4 of these dotted around. Since it has been 10 years + since I've been on a major tour I was wondering a; can you still get the stuff, b; is that method still acceptable for producing the smoke or has it gone out of the window with 'elf n safety and c; is there any other method. Reason that I'm asking this is because none of the vocals that I now work with like smoke from a machine, and I recall the above method caused no problems. Any suggestions gratefully recieved. (We didn't have this problem before the smoking ban!!) Cheers, Billy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
niclights Posted August 18, 2009 Share Posted August 18, 2009 As I understand the old cracked oil machines were made illegal due to the carcinogenic properties. But modern equivalent is mineral oil forced through mesh by compressed air. See Reel EFX DF-50/Swefog/MDG atmospheres etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billy bobinski Posted August 19, 2009 Author Share Posted August 19, 2009 Cheers for that, Nic Thats the kind of thing that I'm looking for (albeit a bit pricey - does anyone know where there are any used ones) but as it says on Reels site, no more sore throats. We've got to keep the Artiste happy ain't we? :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csg Posted August 19, 2009 Share Posted August 19, 2009 I strongly recommend you take a look at the pea soup phantom system. After having a demo 6 months ago, I bought one and it is simply the best haze system I have ever used bar none - and yes I have used all the normal candidates line df50 / cirromist / mdg / unique / le maitre.it is oil based so no probs with sore throats, outperforms cracked oil / compressor based machines and is a lot cheaper than the mdg which is the nearest equivalent - and its made in the uk I recently have used this system for a month of filming for a very high profile tv production comming to the bbc at christmas, where it was used to provide virtually all the haze and smoke effects ( virtually every scene), with no residue problems, or complaints from anybody in the area of use. I have no connection with this company, nor anything to gain, but I cant sing the praises of this machine enough. www.smokemachines.net/ ive got the smallest smoke machine in the phantom range, and it will quickly and evenly haze any venue I have gone ito in the last 6 months. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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