Chris Beesley Posted February 17, 2009 Share Posted February 17, 2009 Hi Guys, Its not often I post a "help me" thread but here goes... I have been roped into helping out the local scouts & guides with their bi-annual show and they want an effect similar to the fog screens for projection... but dont have the budget. So, has anybody any ideas for either a similar effect or something with similar "wow factor"? They do have a budget for hire... just not £1K for a week :unsure: Just a quick ad... the show is in a typical school hall with stage roughly 8x6m with 4m high prosc arch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ynot Posted February 17, 2009 Share Posted February 17, 2009 Hmmm... I seem to recall we touched on this topic before...the response was I believe that it's not really practical - either on the cheap or in the size of venue you have.I think even the expensive screens need a fair distance from 'screen' to viewer to stand any chance of being reasonably visible - and that with a pretty high output projector... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JackPott Posted February 17, 2009 Share Posted February 17, 2009 Hmm could you flank a traditional projection screen in dense smoke? Maybe even hide its decent in a bit of fog too?There is a danger of it turning into a 1980's episode of Top of the Pops though... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy_s Posted February 17, 2009 Share Posted February 17, 2009 Hmm could you flank a traditional projection screen in dense smoke? Maybe even hide its decent in a bit of fog too?There is a danger of it turning into a 1980's episode of Top of the Pops though... this might work for the projection side, but would defeat the object of having a smoke screen - ie the ability to walk through it. I saw this demonstrated at PLASA last year and can give you the contact of the partner manager in Finland - I took a business card. But you've rightly identified the fly in the ointment - money. for a walk-through effect, you could perhaps try creating a slash curtain out of strips of projection material and experiment with that, with a bit of haze or fog. It would be vulnerable to draughts in a way that surprisingly the fogscreen isn't, (or didn't appear to be at PLASA) but you might be able to get a viewable image that a performer could walk through. Alternatively, strips of white elastic (very wide variety)held in a frame, that would snap back into place once the actor had passed through. failing that, you could try being very clever with the filming, like Forkbeard Fantasy shows - the actor's filmed image aparently approaches the screen from the other side, then with some clever blocking, the real-life actor appears as if they have stepped from the screen. quite complicated to set up convincingly, though. I guess (though I didn't see it) that something similar was done to interface between film and live action in Kneehigh's production of Brief Encounter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
w/robe Posted February 17, 2009 Share Posted February 17, 2009 for a walk-through effect, you could perhaps try creating a slash curtain out of strips of projection material and experiment with that, with a bit of haze or fog. It would be vulnerable to draughts... I've seen white lycra stretched on a frame with slits in it so that people can stretch it and step through the image. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElectroKinetic Posted May 15, 2009 Share Posted May 15, 2009 Mabye I have the wrong idea of what a fog screen is but you can take some pvc piping and drill a hole every 15cm or so, run upto about 10ft of flexible shop vac pipe and then put that end up against the nozzle of a fog machine. After about 10ft you will need a fan to push the fog through. Using PVC or metal piping at the nozzle end helps keep the tubing from melting. You can run w/o that but if someone knocks the tubing to a funny angle, the plastic starts to get soft. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andy_s Posted May 15, 2009 Share Posted May 15, 2009 I think in this instance what is meant is a projection screen made of fog, not a smokescreen. here's the FogScreen website It is in effect what you describe - a combination of fog generator, ducting and fan, but pretty seriously engineered to achieve a useful surface for projection, and NB it's not the same kind of fog generating process as your standard hazer or minimist. has the scouts' show happened yet? was a budget solution found?, Chris, update us if you can! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jivemaster Posted May 15, 2009 Share Posted May 15, 2009 The clever bit is the aerodynamics that creates a large laminar flow of fog. Lots of small fans fed through a slat arrangement start to give a smooth laminar flow into which you put smoke/fog possibly cooled. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ItayGal Posted May 15, 2009 Share Posted May 15, 2009 The clever bit is the aerodynamics that creates a large laminar flow of fog. Lots of small fans fed through a slat arrangement start to give a smooth laminar flow into which you put smoke/fog possibly cooled.Jivemaster is right. and the fog is produced by Ultrasound made by piezzo electric "speakers" that deprecating the water into mist, then this mist is being pushed down by the fans between two "walls" of air that are also created by more fans. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Posted May 15, 2009 Share Posted May 15, 2009 Try a high output smoke machine with a low smoke converter on it. Then with some clever tubing you might be able to get the smoke to drop in front of a standard screen. It hopefully will give you a low budget look of the effect your looking for! Then again, it might not! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Beesley Posted May 15, 2009 Author Share Posted May 15, 2009 Cheers for the responses guys - the show happened back in March, I came up with the idea of two aerial masts each top and bottom of a bright white sheet of cloth. The screen could be raised from the stage floor behind the cast at exactly the right moment the "TBOD" was lifted from the projector - hey presto a screen that appeared then could be dropped out the way. I did contact Fog Screen but as usuall with scout/guide shows they dont have massive budgets - so the fog screen was out ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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