First Year Lessons Learnt – As presented at 2024 Perth Mini

[Johnnyboy]

Hi All,

For those who have read my first-year thread (https://auschristmaslighting.com/threads/2023-journey-first-display-for-johnnyboy.15380/), this post might be a little repetitive, but I wanted to make a separate post on all the things I learned in my first year, good, bad, or otherwise. Please share your own experiences about your lighting journey. The photos are from the slideshow I put together for the 2024 Perth Mini held on 8 June 2024.

Intro – I have broken the presentation into two main sections, Thinks I did well and Thinks I've Learnt


3D – When I first discovered xLights, I thankfully didn’t invest too much time with the 2D option before reading up on the benefits of 3D. I am reasonably proficient in SketchUp and invested a few hours to draw out my house. Very much worth it, and I recommend everyone make the jump to 3D if you haven’t already done so.


Shelly Smart Relays – Turning your controller boxes on and off is a given, but until I saw someone mention these devices, I planned to use rail-mounted timers. They would have done the job, but this has been so much more convenient. It lets me turn on the whole display from my phone/PC for testing, extending show durations, and modifying programs for start/stop. Highly recommend some type of smart device to turn on your controller boxes.



Drilling conduits – This was painful to do, but I'm super happy with the result. It gives a super clean/straight look that I love and is very easy to store and move around. I also made sure each length was 100 pixels long so they are all interchangeable. Just add the custom length extra bit beyond 100 pixels. Going 1-inch spacing might have been overkill though!


3D printing – I didn’t think 3D printing would be as helpful as it has been. Basically, everything is improved with a 3D printer, from the coro mounts, gutter clips, and cable labels. This year I’ve been printing various controller mounts and making/modifying my own models. Very rewarding and fun addition to the hobby.


Custom length pixel strings – I go on and on about this, but getting custom anything makes your job so much easier. I knew what I wanted in my display very early and was able to order custom everything for the most part. Being able to order 20 strings of 48 pixels for my stars was fantastic and saved me a lot of soldering as well as from purchasing extra pigtails. I also got 1.5m leads on the start/end of the strings so I didn’t need to use extension cables in a lot of places. This is also well worth the extra money for custom. This year I even managed to get 2-core xConnect power injection pigtails built right into the string.

 

[Johnnyboy]

Template software such as JDeation (RIP) – This is a sad one as JDeation is closed as of 1/7/2024. It was a fantastic site that let you purchase custom stuff as well as just play around on the design software and print 1:1 scale stuff at home for free. Hopefully, another company steps up to fill the void. I also was really happy with the Powercon True1 connectors from Aliexpress, waaay cheaper than the real Powercon stuff but performed amazingly well. A really easy way to make water-resistant connections. Just make sure you have both male/female plus if you design your boxes for the in/out like I have.


Cost of everything – Everyone said it's $1/pixel and they are right. I tracked every dollar I spent last year and it's all true, make sure you budget for more than just the cost of pixels. Along with cost, the time to do everything is way more than I thought. I would say 500+ hours last year working on Christmas lights. Learning how, researching, building, re-building, fixing, problem-solving, all takes much longer than you think it will.


Cables sometimes fail – Brand new things sometimes fail. I had a pre-made network cable fail that was causing my display to stutter. Replacing the cable fixed the show instantly. I also discovered a dodgy 7.6m extension cable and dodgy pigtail. If in doubt, try a new cable to rule it out.


Have a drip point before controller boxes – My little push-button audio box fell into my garden bed. It rained and water ran down the cable and into the box (even with cable glands on everything). When I opened it up, I tipped out about 100ml of water and that was the end of those electronics. Just be mindful of where you put your boxes and that any cables going into your box have a low point before entering your box so that water drips off.


Buy more extension cables than you think you need – I thought I had heaps. Turns out I was short by about 6 cables. Thankfully I had 3-core cable and pigtails on hand and could make up the extras as I needed them. Would have much preferred to have pre-made cables available.


Check how props are modeled – I incorrectly modeled my icicles and it should have been alternative drop. The others were correct, but the topmost was in the standard configuration. Not a huge issue, but does change how some effects are displayed. I also learned how to rotate props correctly in xLights (hint, don’t just use the 3D rotation tool). Then got further into xLights by modifying the model pixel positions to make it more symmetrical. It wasn’t needed but a fun thing to learn.

 

[Johnnyboy]

Mark symmetric props with an up arrow – Common sense, but label the up direction on your props. It takes all of 2 seconds and saves you trying to figure it out on a ladder. Thankfully the only one I got wrong was on the ground level.


Cable glands – right size for the right job – When I purchased my cable glands originally, I was unaware of the different sizes for 2-core, 3-core, power cables, and speaker cables I was going to use. Much better to understand what cables are needed to be used and buy the right cable gland for the right job. I now have a huge selection of cable glands (plus some new 4-wire ones that I won at this mini!) and will never run out in my lifetime!



Thanks for reading - Happy to answer any questions you might have. Please add your own lessons learnt so others can learn what worked and what didn't work.

 

[mshort]

Great read. I did the first-year presentation at Sydney and you, and I took very different approaches to our first year but some of our lessons learnt are very similar. I think they key is learn lot, be prepared to fail a little and have fun.