Computer Projection Rain Effect

[Zulu]

Hi folks.

when requiring a rain effect, my theatre has always hired a big old fashioned lighting projector with a huge rotating glass wheel with an image of rainy streaks rotating in a downward direction.

 

I thought, in this digital age, a "movie" of rain (probably digitally created rather than filmed) could be projected from an ordinary computer projector connected to a laptop.

 

Has anyone considered this, or tried it? Anyone know of any suitable "Rain movies" I could download from tinternet?

 

cheers, Zulu.

[timtheenchanteruk]

if you have access to after effects, it can easily be created using that, failing that I do have a green chroma background I can let you have a copy of (will just need to dig it out)

I used that live with a camera last year, worked really well cameras on soloist, chroma`d in the rain.

[GRisdale]

Hippotizer media servers have a rain generator built in, allowing you to specify density, speed, angle, drop length etc and super-impose this onto other imagery. The cool thing about this is that you can get the rain to start and stop, or even intensify, on cue.

 

I've found that two layers of rain with a layer of light fog works for me.

 

Gareth.

[GridGirl]

Yeah, we did it 18 months ago with a show where the back wall of the set was a projection screen. I think the rain clip was downloaded from Shutterstock - decent clips for not too much money at all. We ran it off a DVD player, but that's just personal preference! It worked pretty well - the only thing, as usual with projections, is that you have to make sure your actors aren't between the projector and the surface you're projecting on.

 

I am, however, going to move this thread to the Video section as it really belongs there!