strobe lights

[james campbell]

I just got some strobes and was wanting to know how to best show them in my animation? I now they have to be 100 percent on so you can't use shimmer or twinkle. Also what is the minimum about in time you can have them on and all fire a few times for good effect?

[rgardner518]

I made a jig to hold each and every one. The C9 socket fits in perfectly, and when one goes out, you just unscrew and rescrew back in. Quick!

I wanted to unscrew the white PVC fitting and store it for the winter, but being out in the elements all winter long, they are almost impossible to take apart without breaking. If I had though about it I would have lubed the treads up, before I put them together.


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[Surfing4Dough]

james campbell wrote:

I just got some strobes and was wanting to know how to best show them in my animation? I now they have to be 100 percent on so you can't use shimmer or twinkle. Also what is the minimum about in time you can have them on and all fire a few times for good effect?

I think what you are meaning is how do you draw them in your animation visualizer (not in your yard), so what I do is pick a bright color you don't use (teal blue in my case) and I just draw 1 or 2 adjacent pixels for each strobe -- most of which are in clusters so just clump several of these together to represent that group of strobes. When they are lit, even though they are solid (since they are 100% on like you said), they tend to stand out from the rest of the animation colors so you can picture them flashing then a little better. Once you have a display with them, you are able to picture them in your head pretty well.

Another thing that I have thought about doing is to duplicate the strobe channel, but don't have the clone assigned to an actual controller channel, but instead use twinkle or shimmer on the dummy channel and only draw that channel in the visualizer. Takes a little more time, but probably would have done that my first year had I thought of it then. Shouldn't add much time though since you aren't dealing with fade effects or heavy use on that strobe channel--usually only have the strobe effect on for 3-5 seconds here or there (and again only at 100%) so easy to convert it to shimmer/twinkle on the dummy channel.

[james campbell]

Surfing4Dough wrote:

james campbell wrote:

I just got some strobes and was wanting to know how to best show them in my animation? I now they have to be 100 percent on so you can't use shimmer or twinkle. Also what is the minimum about in time you can have them on and all fire a few times for good effect?

I think what you are meaning is how do you draw them in your animation visualizer (not in your yard), so what I do is pick a bright color you don't use (teal blue in my case) and I just draw 1 or 2 adjacent pixels for each strobe -- most of which are in clusters so just clump several of these together to represent that group of strobes. When they are lit, even though they are solid (since they are 100% on like you said), they tend to stand out from the rest of the animation colors so you can picture them flashing then a little better. Once you have a display with them, you are able to picture them in your head pretty well.

Another thing that I have thought about doing is to duplicate the strobe channel, but don't have the clone assigned to an actual controller channel, but instead use twinkle or shimmer on the dummy channel and only draw that channel in the visualizer. Takes a little more time, but probably would have done that my first year had I thought of it then. Shouldn't add much time though since you aren't dealing with fade effects or heavy use on that strobe channel--usually only have the strobe effect on for 3-5 seconds here or there (and again only at 100%) so easy to convert it to shimmer/twinkle on the dummy channel

thats correct in my animation for the sequences.you answered my question perfectly thanks

[Cray Augsburg]

For my strobes, I fugured there was no way to accurately replicate them in the visualizer. So . . .

I simply used a color (as suggested by Surfing4Dough) I don't use elsewhere (cyan in my case), and spell out the word STROBES in the upper right corner. I used a 5x7 character matrix. When the strobes are on, the word is very visible on the animator screen.

On a related note, I fire them up about a half second before I want them to be strobing. Similarly, I turn them OFF about a second before I want them to stop. You'll have to experiment with how short a time you think you can leave them on -- satisfaction is all in the eye of the beholder. For me, I would think they need to be on at least a few seconds for the viewer's eye to be drawn to them and realize what is happening.

Just my two cents.

EDIT - Also, as Surfing4Dough suggested, use them sparingly or the effect is overdone and people get tired of it. In 2009, I used them at two points about 16 seconds each in one song. They fit the music (there was a change to a high-pitched tremolo/bell effect in the music at these two locations). I didn't use them anywhere else in the show that year.

Here is the video: http://vimeo.com/8472099