chowell Posted August 21, 2009 Share Posted August 21, 2009 From yesterday, assuming you are lighting on the night of Thanksgiving as I do, we only have 14 weeks to lights on! 14 weeks! That means many of us only have five weeks or so until setup begins. I'm feeling the crunch!I went from 80 channels last year to 176 this year so I am re-sequencing my songs from last year. I just finished my second of six from last year and have finished one new one so three are complete with four to go. I am also wanting to add some new songs this year also if time allows. I've added several new features this year including 2 seven channel light poles, 1 more leaping arch for a total of 3, 2 Coro Bells, 14 more mini trees, and two more arches outlining the yard for a total of 8, each carrying two channels/colors. I've still got much of this to complete, let alone figure out how to install some of it. You've got to be kidding me! We must be insane!!! Christmas music in August? I'm gonna need it!Where are all of you at in your progress?Corey Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Simmons Posted August 23, 2009 Share Posted August 23, 2009 Hey, I'm feeling pretty good this time around. Last year I was behind the entire year, so this is a nice treat. I've added two dozen mini trees - 12 three-color for my yard and 12 two-color for the neighbor's. I've finished wrapping four new arches and three new light poles. I've even gotten two new coro lighted signs finished. Talk about freakin' amazing... my goal was to have all that done by the end of Aug, so these are gravy days now through the end of the month. Plenty of time to make extension cords this year while the wire is still supple and my fingers are still warm, and lots of time to split between sequencing and keeping my skids greased by pulling my fair share of the load keeping the yard up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
friskybri Posted August 23, 2009 Share Posted August 23, 2009 Looking forward to your sequences george. Was wondering how many channels you up to? Was all your light polls on just seven channels or did you have seven for each light poll. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Simmons Posted August 24, 2009 Share Posted August 24, 2009 It's looking like this year will be 304 unless LOR calls and makes me a deal I can't refuse. My arches (all 8) are seven channels each and all of them are independent. The light poles (or firesticks as a lot of people call them) are nine channels each. Last year they were all identical. This year I've split half of them off separately. I'm up to a dozen new sequences for this year and that's probably all I'm gonna get done since I still have most of last year's to upgrade with the new channels. I'll be taking a LOT more video this year. Thanks for asking. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwilling Posted August 24, 2009 Share Posted August 24, 2009 chowell wrote: From yesterday, assuming you are lighting on the night of Thanksgiving as I do, we only have 14 weeks to lights on! 14 weeks! That means many of us only have five weeks or so until setup begins. I'm feeling the crunch!...Where are all of you at in your progress?Keep a "Monster Garage-esque" countdown clock above the desk in my (home) office, so I'm always (painfully) aware of the movement of time... (says the man in the 17 foot long multi-coloured scarf, quietly chuckling to himself at the irony)Finishing housings for two new controllers, struggling with that increasingly insistent voice in the back of the head saying that the 'flow' of the songs in this year's set list is still not quite right, still not started on the frame for the 'Z'-Tree that I decided to shift to for this year from the more common pole based mega-tree, have not yet committed the scripts for the voice-overs to paper, having a bit of a frantic moment with the delay of the CCR (hard to integrate properly when you can not see/play with it), trying to (finally) decide if this is the year to go to LED floods (and the associated DC controller) or to do one more year with the incandescent, trying to avoid making any (more) changes to the overall layout... Must be something else that I am forgetting...Oh yes, of course...Getting the sequences for the rest of the songs completed!Overall... no more behind schedule than usual... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cenote Posted August 24, 2009 Share Posted August 24, 2009 I'm so far behind, there is no way I can get done what I wanted too. only have 1/2 of my 12 days of Christmas wire frames done and nothing done on some other ideas I have. looking like I'm going to scrap this year, and go to plan B. Just put a few lights controlled on the house, and the colored spots out. Than have an announcement between songs apologizing to people, thanking them, and tell them I'll be back in full force next year due to the construction I am planning on part of my house the end of this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Stevens Posted August 25, 2009 Share Posted August 25, 2009 cenote wrote: I'm so far behind, there is no way I can get done what I wanted too. only have 1/2 of my 12 days of Christmas wire frames done and nothing done on some other ideas I have. looking like I'm going to scrap this year, and go to plan B. Just put a few lights controlled on the house, and the colored spots out. Than have an announcement between songs apologizing to people, thanking them, and tell them I'll be back in full force next year due to the construction I am planning on part of my house the end of this year.Huh? Apologizing to people? Why? Did you guarantee completion of your plan A? Do they even know what your plan A is?Only you and those you tell know it's not complete. Everyone else will wonder how you got so much done.Spoken by a person who hasn't completed his first sequence yet. My first year with LOR, 64 channels, wishing I had more, at the same time griping about the number of channels I have to sequence.My wife heard Judy Pancoast's "House on Christmas Street." I'm under orders to actually do it! If I don't get it all done, it's still more than the neighbors expect. Still more than anyone else in town, although I'm not doing it for them; I'm doing it for myself. I'll definitely be "borrowing" some downloaded sequences. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LENNY RUEL Posted August 25, 2009 Share Posted August 25, 2009 Time wise should be OK. 22 of 25 songs done and the one I'm on is the one I dreaded, Disney's Believe In Holiday Magic. 9 minutes in of 13:25 total length so down hill now. I got my first of four 15' nine channel leaping arches wrapped this weekend and have all of the components for my mega tree. I'm using a 3" sch 40 pvc center pole and am building the head out of a 3x4 drain and a 4" cap so all pvc.Need to put the rope light on the 3D star topper yet I got from Mike Gardner for the mega tree. And I can start bundling strings of red, green and clear lights in between everything else ( I only have about 70 bundles to do:shock: ) .Need to pull over the voiceovers yet from the demented elf to LOR and put some lights on but that shouldn't be to bad.Still a big jump from my way to late 16 channels start up I had last year though.Lenny Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brandon Kibler Posted August 25, 2009 Share Posted August 25, 2009 I have: 6 out of the 10 mini trees to wrap with W,R,G. 8 firesticks to wrap yet, finish up a coro Santa, fix minis on leaping arches that are not working, put the cords on 8 controllers, build enclosures for DMX fixtures, string mini lights on mega tree star, build window frames with W,R,G, and rework last years sequences and sequence new songs.Ok, back to work.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
friskybri Posted August 25, 2009 Share Posted August 25, 2009 nervous about first year. Went from nothing but icicle lights on house to 128 channels this year. 9 mini trees, W,G,R four colors on house and windows. 4 arches bunch of wire frames. ect. got 8 songs done and now have to rework do to going from 8 mini to 9 and one color on windows to 4. I need to stop adding channels. this is the 5th rework this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crazytrain83 Posted August 25, 2009 Share Posted August 25, 2009 For those of us who focus on Halloween...the situation is even more urgent.We're about a month away from when we start putting up the fake fence around the yard.Just finished the risers for the pumpkin choir last weekend. Still need to house the one new controller we purchased and do some minor repairs to the props that didn't survive 2008 in perfect/working order.Have all the old songs re-sequenced with the 16 new channels.Finally, I'm about 2 minutes into the MJ "Thriller" tribute....and I'm really glad I went with the 5 minute version instead of the full video version!...but we're getting there! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lightzilla Posted August 25, 2009 Share Posted August 25, 2009 Well this ought to make you guys feel better..........we had FROST and the roof tops on Monday morning......now does it make you feel like you have a bit more time to prepare?I only decorate for Christmas so I figure I have about 2.5 months to have what I need built ...... built.I am working on my arches now and since my arches are different than most well time is not an issue with those.......I cannot afford a whack of LEDs for the arches so I went another route in my design which works well for those like me who cannot afford to go the 1/2 or 3/4 pvc pipe wrapped in white LEDs (it is the lights cost the $$$$).I still have 15 mini trees that need to be wrapped in 3 colours that require 1,050 LEDs per tree.......but I may need to cut that back as well since 16,800 LEDs well cost a pretty penny.I still need to make a small carousel after of course the arches are done.....should be no problem as it is small.Then I need to make two bases for my mini mega trees.....and thats about it.I have enough sequences now but there are a few I still need.....important sequences for my charity. Someone is doing them for me.Snow is possible here at any time now........frost was a start. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph D Posted August 26, 2009 Share Posted August 26, 2009 Hey every one, well my plain a turned into plain b which is now plain "c", I've decided to go slow and easy this year, I'm adding 2 mini arches, maybe a couple of more mini-trees too. lol I say this like I just blink my eyes and there in front of me.he he! What I am going to spend a lot of time on is the sequences really making them look nice this year. so I'll end up around 200 channels this year give or take. its going to be great.....:} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TitusCarnathan Posted August 26, 2009 Share Posted August 26, 2009 only about 92 days to go Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cenote Posted August 26, 2009 Share Posted August 26, 2009 T110431 wrote: only about 92 days to go NOOoooooooooooo say it aint true Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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