harrison0550 Posted November 1, 2012 Share Posted November 1, 2012 Ive been itching for Halloween to be over so I can start hanging lights. Sequencing is about 70% done. Props are made and its almost time to put it all on the house. I couldn't resist last night after all the trick or treaters left I had to drag my newly completed prop out in the yard and hit play. Video is a little shaky and filmed way to close. The trees are just leaning up against my truck and trash cans in the yard. (got to mount them this weekend on the house!) but I just had to see what they looked like running a sequence. Trees are about 4ft tall each and look amazing. Doug at wireframedlites.com made them for me and I could not be happier with the service he provides, the quality of work, and the attention to detail was so much better than I could have expected. I highly recommend him for your wire frames.Two more work days and it all begins! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wallleyes Posted November 1, 2012 Share Posted November 1, 2012 Very nice.Always fun to see something new light up the first time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arteom Posted November 1, 2012 Share Posted November 1, 2012 Haha, thats something I haven't seen. Creative & it looks awesome! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MCas4380 Posted November 2, 2012 Share Posted November 2, 2012 It's going to be a fun year at your house. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WilliamS Posted November 2, 2012 Share Posted November 2, 2012 Man to be a fly on the wall of that workshop. If our chats from this year indicate anything of what I have learned from you this is going to be epic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
harrison0550 Posted November 2, 2012 Author Share Posted November 2, 2012 (edited) Thanks guys, it should be an interesting show this year thats for sure. I'm probably going to have to scale back some of my plans this year as time is running out and I just found out from work I will be going out of town to Virginia all next week. I unfortunately can not take any credit for the trees other than sequencing. They were created by sasmuse AKA Sally Simpson and affectionatly named after her niece "Maggie trees". They made their debut into the lighting world last Nov. here....http://forums.lighto...singing +trees.David over at holidaycoro.com also has them made out of coro.Mine are wire frames made by Doug at wireframedlites.com with a few modifications to the original design. They are wrapped in rope light with THOUSANDS of zip ties. I love them but full design credit goes to Sally Simpson and her niece Maggie. Edited November 2, 2012 by harrison0550 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
harrison0550 Posted November 5, 2012 Author Share Posted November 5, 2012 This weekend marked 2 projects done off the list. Ouchhhhhhhhhhh I'm so worn out. Still have to hang 30 strands of pixels, put out and hook up the mini trees, put out the yard grid, snow fall ball, icicle lights, rope light around yard, windows, door, gutters, roof line, strobes, floods, tune to sign and blah de blah de blah. lol I dont even want to think about what else.http://youtu.be/R1ejLfU6-Us Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DougP Posted November 5, 2012 Share Posted November 5, 2012 Looking great Andy and you did a great jon on lighting the trees. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulXmas Posted November 5, 2012 Share Posted November 5, 2012 WOW!AWSOME! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arteom Posted November 5, 2012 Share Posted November 5, 2012 Love the mega tree! Did you use metal wire and stake it to the ground in the tree shape (like you would do in a traditional mega tree), then attach the lights in a spiral pattern? P.S. Great sequencing on the singing trees Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
harrison0550 Posted November 11, 2012 Author Share Posted November 11, 2012 Thanks, Arteom! Some sequences I purchased from holidaycoro and some I did myself with itsmebob's papagayo to LOR software. The mega tree is just a post up the center painted black with a wooden "bun" top that I put 16 bolts into then took bailing wire from tractor supply and ran 16 evenly spaced pieces down to the ground and stacked them in. Then wrapped the entire tree with 3600 mini lights. Wow thats so much easier to type than to actually do it.Now on to day 3 building!The tools that you need out in the yard for pixels is crazy stupid, ended up grabbing a table to try and keep everything organized.J1sys ECG-P2 mounted in box with 5v power supply. Check, now repeat 4 more times lolSoldering and shrink wrapping all connections, OCD yea maybe.........Controller #1 mounted and done..............Arches going up.......And finally the end result.......And my favorite pick of the night, probably 11 or 12 of the neighborhood kids running around the mega tree and sitting under the arches. Couldn't get all of them in one pic, they wouldn't stay still long enough.................Day 4 starts when the sun comes up and hopefully will complete all the mini trees, yard lines, and start on the house pixels. Wish me luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WilliamS Posted November 11, 2012 Share Posted November 11, 2012 You are no man, but machine of holiday magic. Thank you for all the help early in the year, and glad to see it all coming together for you! The CanCan is awesome. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
harrison0550 Posted November 11, 2012 Author Share Posted November 11, 2012 You are no man, but machine of holiday magic. Thank you for all the help early in the year, and glad to see it all coming together for you! The CanCan is awesome.Thanks GoofyGuy, I'm always happy to help out if I can. I don't know about machine, nobody told my feet, hands, and back I was a machine cause they sure hurt every night I come in from working on the lights. I guess I have a little more to update tonight. We will call it build day 3.5 ................Mounted 2 more LOR boards and put all the wires on them. Then 2 more J1sys ECG-P2's and a few more power supply's for power injection.........Now to bed we go until day 4 starts early in the morning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
harrison0550 Posted November 24, 2012 Author Share Posted November 24, 2012 Well I lost track of the build progress. Fairly sure I grabbed pics throughout the last half of the build but haven't had a free moment to upload them. Ran into some snags with power injection on pixels and flickering that has consumed my free time and sanity this week. However the show went live tonight and features 14 songs with half of them singing songs on the roof. Grabbed a quick video on the iphone tonight and I'm extremely happy with the results................................P.S. Will get better video in a few weeks http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_tmrcCgu5o&feature=g-upl Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WilliamS Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 Well I lost track of the build progress. Fairly sure I grabbed pics throughout the last half of the build but haven't had a free moment to upload them. Ran into some snags with power injection on pixels and flickering that has consumed my free time and sanity this week. However the show went live tonight and features 14 songs with half of them singing songs on the roof. Grabbed a quick video on the iphone tonight and I'm extremely happy with the results................................P.S. Will get better video in a few weeks http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_tmrcCgu5o&feature=g-uplWhoa! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Cole Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 (edited) NICE! .......great job with the pixels Edited November 24, 2012 by Mike Cole Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scubado Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 You deserve to pat yourself on the back! Looks terific! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k6ccc Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 The video looks great!.. I am very interested in your arches. Looks like you mounted RGB pixels with them drilled into holes in the back side of some pipe so that the pixels illuminated the inside of the pipe. What kind and size of pipe, and what was the pixel spacing? Looking at the daylight photo of the arches going up, it looks like there is a black arch immediately inside the white arch. Is that a mechanical support? I will be doing something similar to make a 12 string tree, so I am very interested in what you did. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
harrison0550 Posted November 24, 2012 Author Share Posted November 24, 2012 Thanks for all the compliments guys. I cant wait to get the entire show videoed. The pixels really did some amazing things on certain songs.Jim, the tubing is shark bite tube from home depot........ http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-25ecodZ5yc1v/R-202033055/h_d2/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10053&langId=-1&keyword=sharkbite+tube&storeId=10051#.ULBeF6PxGncThe link is for 100ft 3/8 but I used 3/4 50ft roll for like $25. I couldn't find it on Home Depot's web site though. It looks great and the pixels are WS2811 spaced about 2 inches apart and came out to 50 pixels for 10 ft worth of tubing. The black behind it is just for support. The tubing is to flimsy to stand on its own. I grabbed 4 pvc pipes 1" or 3/4"X10ft long and painted them black. Drove two stakes in the ground 7ft apart and stuck the pvc on it then just carried the sharkbite tub to it and put 4 zip ties on it. Done! lol Total build cost was like $35 plus $72 worth of pixels. I think the drill-bit I used was 3/8 (would have to look) and the pixels locked right into it.Surprisingly the pixels are brighter from the back. The wife wants me to flip them. She's not a fan of the defused look. I have avoided flipping them for the last 2 weeks. If I can just put her off 4 more weeks I swear I will flip them. When I put them in storage I'll flip them any way she wants. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k6ccc Posted November 25, 2012 Share Posted November 25, 2012 I'm glad to hear how you constructed the arches. That is almost exactly what I am doing with a pixel tree except I am doing it with 1 inch Sharkbite (PEX) tubing. My biggest issue so far is getting the PEX to uncoil. Drilling 600 holes is going to be real joy... I have a jig made up for my drill press so it should not be too bad (and I plan to have my kids do most of the drilling). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts