machtoo Posted December 29, 2008 Share Posted December 29, 2008 Well, we did it!! After two years of reading, planning, constructing and a year of sequencing, we had a very successful 128 Channel, 19 song show this year. Response from the viewers was great! Made local news Thanksgiving night, short clip. We're located in Raleigh, NC.By having 19 songs we were able to run continuously from 5-10 each night and have a variety of music for everyone. The LOR controllers worked flawlessly.The only blip we had was our Ramsey 30B stopped working (slight panic) the third day of the show (week after Thanksgiving) and we had to scramble to find a replacement and send the 30B off for repair. We were lucky to connect with John Ramsy himself (original founder of Ramsey Electronics) and purchase his own design Ramsey FM 110 and have it shipped next day. Beautiful transmitter! Lesson learned: have a spare FM transmitter, it is a single point of failure.The show included sequences forIntro (:30)Carol_of_the_Bells_David_Foster_128 (2:30)Christmas Time is Here (2:48)IWantaHippofor Christmas(2:36)Ano Domine (2:10)Christmas Song (3:10)Christmas_canon (4:20)Christmas Eve (Sarajevo)_128 (3:20)It Feels Like Christmas (2:42)PolarExpressMagic2 (8:30)Intro2 (:30)Emmanuel (2:47)Holly Jolly Christmas (2:13)Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy (2:07)Queen of the Winter Night (2:29)StilleNacht_128 (5:25)MostWonderfulTimeoftheYear (2:25)CaroloftheBells128 (1:27)O Tannenbaum (2:08)Wizard_of_Winter_128new (3:06)BelieveHolidayMagic_128New (9:26)We had a 14 foot mega tree with 12,800 lights, four colors, 48 mini trees (16 red, blue green), 16 net lights (8 red, 8 green) stretched on PVC frames, and 16 icycle sets (8 blue, 8 white). About 85% of the display was LOR and 15% static. Total lights was about 50,000. No matter how many times you view the sequence on the computer, you will find tweaks to do when you light up for real.To see the videos, LOR and static, go to YouTube and do a search for "machtoo". This should find all my videos. Make sure you click the "View in HD Link" below the lower right corner of the YouTube viewer area. Much better detail on HD. I recorded the entire show and then used Cyberlink PowerDirector to split it and dub in the original music tracks. Once the first Intro was synched, it was easy to drag the other audio files into place and then cut it into separate files/songs and produce the wmv files. Took about an hour for each song to produce the HD wmv on the PC.Link to one video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqVjpZV_mRYBe sure to click the Watch in HD link on YouTube.Really want to see the servo controller boards come out this year to use for Halloween and Christmas. (Hint, Hint Dan ) Also will need 64 more channels next year!We did Halloween as well with 32 channels as a test bed and that worked great (show included Phantom of the Opera, Sweeney Todd Intro, Adams Family, Headless Horseman, Halloween Movie Theme, Van Helsing Transylvania 1887, Ghostbusters, Grim Grinning Ghosts, This is Halloween plus intros and fillers).Already started planning for next season! Only 361 days to Christmas! Hoping to have a website up soon! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff 1S.A.H.D. Posted December 29, 2008 Share Posted December 29, 2008 Good job, like the checker pattern on the ground"Its the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" was wondering who sang this song thanks Jeff Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
machtoo Posted December 29, 2008 Author Share Posted December 29, 2008 It was Johhny Mathis. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Dorr Posted December 31, 2008 Share Posted December 31, 2008 You sure bit off a lot for a first year, and it was all done very well. The way the video was shot is an interesting perspective. Isn't it fun? Be sure to post your website URL when it is up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
machtoo Posted February 1, 2009 Author Share Posted February 1, 2009 My website is up and running.http://www.tauntonstales.comEnjoy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Dorr Posted February 1, 2009 Share Posted February 1, 2009 machtoo wrote: My website is up and running.http://www.tauntonstales.comDean, just checked out your website but couldn't view any of the pictures. Kept getting the old 404 error when clicking on a thumbnail. In fact, the thumbnail isn't actually a picture, but a placeholder where the picture should be. Maybe it's because my browser is Firefox.As you said, it does take a long time for the videos to load. Have you thought of posting them on Vimeo, or another video sharing website that won't delete them or mute the audio because of perceived copyright infringement, and then embedding a link to them on your website? That way your "audience" can see the videos much more quickly. Just a thought.Looking forward to more content as it is added. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
machtoo Posted February 1, 2009 Author Share Posted February 1, 2009 I am sure it is a Firefox issue. It has been working well with IE users. Broadband users with greater than a T-1 have not had an issue downloading the videos.The Thumbnails on the picture pages were created using a thumbnail tool. Other pictures are placeholders.However, the videos are on YouTube if you search for "Machtoo", my forum handle.Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
machtoo Posted February 1, 2009 Author Share Posted February 1, 2009 P.S. Another possibility is I hit my bandwidth limit for the month which is 3 Gigs, especially if there have been a lot of viewers.Machtoo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Dorr Posted February 1, 2009 Share Posted February 1, 2009 machtoo wrote: I am sure it is a Firefox issue. It has been working well with IE users. Broadband users with greater than a T-1 have not had an issue downloading the videos.You were right. I was able to view the pictures in IE. Guess I'll have to check my cable download speeds for the videos. I did check them out on YouTube and they are great. Looks like you're one of the lucky ones that YouTube hasn't shut down your TSO songs. How many mini-trees do you have? There are a ton of them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
machtoo Posted February 1, 2009 Author Share Posted February 1, 2009 Tim,I had 48 mini trees, 3 rows, one blue, one red, one green. Based on your feedback, I added more info and a link on my Christmas video page to allow a user to go to the YouTube page with all my videos.Question, are your elves rope light? I am designing and constructing six 8 foot tall rope light characters and animating the mouths. arms, feet etc. I will have a singing tree, snowman, Santa, and a marching and saluting toy soldier. One will be standing only. They will be constructed from 3/4" PVC.Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Dorr Posted February 2, 2009 Share Posted February 2, 2009 machtoo wrote: Tim,I had 48 mini trees, 3 rows, one blue, one red, one green.Question, are your elves rope light? That's a lot of mini-trees. They add a lot to your show.My elves are made with a white coroplast 4'X4' background and mini-lights spaced about 3/4" apart. The coroplast is mounted on metal studs. You can see the frame on our roof in one of the earlier 2008 Christmas Lights Display post. I basically followed Marty Slack's PPT how-to available on his website at http://www.christmasutah.com. I'm putting together my first Halloween light display and will be using the same technique to make a talking/singing pumpkin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NWSanta Posted February 2, 2009 Share Posted February 2, 2009 Wholly Crap that's a lot of lights! Very Effective and certainly very eye catching!-Evan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MJ Posted February 8, 2009 Share Posted February 8, 2009 No audio! Youtube stripped the audio? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
machtoo Posted February 9, 2009 Author Share Posted February 9, 2009 You can go to my site now. www.tauntonstales.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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