Ynot

Closed the doors on my 250 seat community venue on Monday after the PM's broadcast - that was painful, despite being necessary. And whilst it's a very successful volunteer run space, and most of us have day jobs that will continue (I've been a BT homeworker for 17 years, so not a lot of change for me there!) it's still going to be a huge struggle. The next show on stage would have been the annual gang show - they had a full rehearsal on Sunday then get kicked by the closure a day later :( (And the fact that the Scout Association apparently e-mailed them all with their edict that they highly recommended cessation of ALL group activities). We have had a really busy season drop-kicked into touch. Some of them may be able to reschedule over the summer - we close for maintenance and refurbs mid July til September) but that's only if their casts (and audiences) are able to cater for it - I'm guessing that there will be HUGE numbers fighting over holidays in August to make up for those missed during this crisis...

On the whole, in my experience, DJs tend to mostly have their own gear. So unless you want to look at the option of short notice hire for bits that they've lost or had damaged, I can't see much of a market...

I have a skeleton DMX - analog demux - 24 channel - but wouldn't let that go for less than £100 to be honest.

So my usual hire guy has come up blank for the hire of what I'd needed for a show next weekend, needed a 10,000 lum machine minimum He'd previously been able to get a 12k proj for around £400 but the closest he can find amongst his (midlands) contacts is 3 times that which is way over budget. Anyone have any hire co's that could do one for me at short notice? Cheers

Prolights 30kg ones are cheaper - don't need anything heavier duty.

Just looking at the Prolight ones now - and they certainly look like they'll do the job. And I've gone for their 30kg clamps - we don't have anything near that weight in house stock so those look a marvelous choice - thanks all.

Looking around at the moment for a box of new trigger clamps - these on CPC Quite a few options on the market - CPC has them for £18.98 plus vat and a couple of places I've found do them at cheaper plus delivery (which puts those in the same ball-park as CPC). Anyone got any contacts for these at a fair but lower price before I take the plunge? Probably looking for 15 or so.

Who has told you that 'it will be ok'...? If it was the visiting company then that's worth nothing in the grand scheme - if you (or whoever is the responsible authority for the venue if it's not you) say that it's NOT acceptable, then they, the visitors, will have to abide by that ruling. However, if the venue manager is the one saying that it's OK, and they've looked at how the confetti is being used (and done their own dynamic RA) then you would have to step back. If you're still unhappy with that situation then you have options - appeal to the venue management or if they remain unconcerned then you can walk away if you don't wish to be associated with something you feel is an unmitigated risk.

The answer can depend on whether you want a dedicated lantern to hit the mirror ball or if you can work a mover into the mix to hit it as needed. The much higher power in a tight focussed mover is my preferred option when designing shows that want the MB effect and the most recent choices have been Mac Quantum (LED) profile that can depend on whether your design will allow a close enough hanging point to cater for the 12 degree minimum beam on the Quantum without too mush wall splash behind the ball. Or whilst not being LED, the still low-ish power Robe Pointe (insert whatever beam light you can get hold of) that one blows an ACL well out of the water when it comes to MB effect. And with the much tighter beam angle can do the job from quite some distance. :)

It might also be equable with the film world - well, maybe NOT the modern movie sets where so many epic 'stunts' seem to be green-screened and CGI, but certainly those of not that many decades ago. Movie stunt men (and women/children) were renowned for their apparent lack-lustre approach to safety yet were probably amongst the safest on any film set. Simply because they rehearsed their moves ahead of the shoot days so that when it came to cameras rolling they'd got it off-pat without any foreseeable errors. Maybe not quite the rigorous practice that circus-folk go through but the principle is still there. Make the mistakes in a safe (er) environment so that when it matters, all goes according to plan.

I just sent that link to my daughter, who's learning some hoop & silks and my niece who's teaching her... Niece says "where do I find a copter" - daughter says "HELL NO!!" :D :D :D

Certainly do. :( I often have to search our building for those that have 'walked' this way.

I've ordered her a couple of adaptors to try - see if that gives enough clearance. Seems the simplest and cheapest option.

That's my fall-back option anyway if the actual adaptor doesn't exist.And tbh, I guess it's not something that is going to be in huge demand, so unlikely...

Had a quick look through the usual suspects' sites but as yet haven't come up with a solution... Friend of mine has a quick-release cast-based mic stand - the sort with a trigger grip rather than a twist to allow her to slide the stick up/down to suit. She's just bought one of those retro mics with the cable entry moulded at a slight angle, the 50s style... But when she screws the head onto the stand, there's not quite enough room to plug in the XLR as it fouls on the grip. So I've been looking for an extender which has a female 3/8 thread to screw on first and then a male 3/8 thred on top to give her maybe half an inch or so more that she needs... Any thoughts?

Borrow would be perfect, but the realist in me expects to hire. That's already a backup plan, though wouldn't be silver.... :D

For Singin' In the Rain (June this year) I'm looking for some vintage 1920's ish wheeled movie studio stands that I can drop some movie-looking lanterns on as practical kit for one of the scenes. 1920s lanterns would be ideal of course, but at a stretch I have a handful of Patt 223s that would look almost the part (99% of the punters won't know the difference :) ) but it's the stands with wheels I've not yet sourced. Anyone any ideas?

Didn't someone post on here a while back with a bar clamp/hook thingumabob that does just that??

You can program the Arduino with a preset pattern or sequence, I'm sure. Then you'd have the option to trigger that effect with a DMX signal or even just a power-up (via a DMX switch maybe) if it's just a single effect state that starts up on power...

We used 4 arduinos to control our 64-square Chess floor a couple of months ago. (I didn't do the programming but can get the code if you want). Each of the squares had 61 RGB LEDs so each Arduino Mega managed 976 LEDs. For our purposes we just had them doing the same thing in each square, but I'm pretty sure that with code changes it's 'easy' to have them do fancier patterns etc.

LED tape - like most other LED kit - is getting steadily brighter for even the budget stuff these days. Without knowing the stage size/set make-up etc it'll be hard to say whether or not using the best available tape will light your scene sufficiently or in the way that you/the director wants it done. But if it's very moody and dim lighting you need it may very well fit the bill. My 8 x 8 square chess board floor was built using 5050 LED tape (with 5v power and data from DMX driven Arduino) - about 70 LEDs per square - and was very bright even under perspex and frosted gel, casting a goodly amount of light upwards. There's a video of that in a different topic if you're interested. If the panto's not imminent, it's probably worth getting a strip and giving it a try. E2A - I'll second Adam's comment about volt drop - if you use long lengths make sure you feed the DC volts to BOTH ends of the tape - possibly even the mid-point as well, using decent gauge wire. Short lengths (up to a couple of metres) should be fine though with just both ends term'd. And make sure you have beefy PSUs - the current draw of LEDs at low voltage is surprisingly high when you have longer lengths

If someone has plugged in a faulty fixture into successive channels to try to get that faulty unit to work that COULD be a possible explanation...Or just unlucky enough to have 3 lamps blow on those channels - which MAY be an indication you could be using incorrectly rated lamps for the supply volts - eg 220v lamps in a 235 or 240v area so the over-current draw is causing lamps to overheat and blow early in life and thus take out the triacs. Just a thought.

The link James posted has a DOWNLOAD button which takes you to the pay-for-it page.

I do have Photoshop and whilst I was not going spend £3 paying for the files, I did do a screen cap of the twenty from the samples page and tried to open that - got the obligatory warning and refusal to open the file, so yes - they ARE copies of the old legal tender and as such that site IS breaking the law..... Although it's actually quoting prices in Euros, the site is clearly (unless hiding behind a false location) outside of the UK, so probably thinking the long arm of British law can't reach them....

Ah - the reason those novelty ones look familiar is because they ARE similar to the "Series E (Variant)" old notes as seen a bit down this page- last issued in 2007... So they ARE in fact taking an OLD but real note and manipulating it somewhat... That MAY be a fine line to be crossing...