Heathwood Lights

MarcD

Full time elf
Joined
Sep 7, 2012
Messages
338
Location
Heathwood Qld
Here's the first pic of all the lights on. You can just see virtual Santa in the window on the right. I also shot some video, but will need to change the audio to the music files because you can't hear the music. I will post that once it's been edited.
 

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MarcD

Full time elf
Joined
Sep 7, 2012
Messages
338
Location
Heathwood Qld
Thanks Shell. The polar bear came from delasdirect.com.au as far as I can remember. He wasn't expensive. There's a giant inflatable working snow globe coming to fill the gap in front of the polar bear.

ShellNZ said:
Looks absolutely gorgeous MarcD, how much do you want for the polar bear, I luv him ;)
 

MarcD

Full time elf
Joined
Sep 7, 2012
Messages
338
Location
Heathwood Qld
Here's the first video. Apologies for the poor quality. This is my first attempt at using my DSLR to capture video. Also my first attempt at editing video. It should be enough to give you the idea.

Bear in mind that this is our first year and the budget only allowed for controlling our Big W strings and a few other bits an pieces with 47 channels.

The video
 

Bevo

Let your Light Shine before men
Joined
Dec 30, 2010
Messages
313
Location
Caboolture QLD
Great effort MarcD it looks really good. ;)

You should be happy with your display and now you can sit back and watch eveybody's faces as they watch your master piece dance.

Merry Christmas
 

AAH

I love blinky lights :)
Community project designer
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Dec 27, 2010
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4,188
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Eaglehawk
Looks good and hard to believe you can do that with only 47 channels.
 

Kaden

Pixels! I need more pixels!
Joined
Jan 10, 2012
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724
Location
Gold Coast
Driver said:
Impressive - and I hate to "High 5" Hi-5 music - but that's a good choice of song too!

+1 the young kids love the Hi-5 Christmas songs!

Good job, especially considering you we're on a tight budget.
 

MarcD

Full time elf
Joined
Sep 7, 2012
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338
Location
Heathwood Qld
We had a car pull up at bout 9:30 last night. After all the music and everyone had gone. I had a look outside and there was a little girl all dressed up like a dancer. I went out to tell them about the upcoming Santa visits and the mum said they couldn't make it then. The daughter is appearing nightly in the Christmas parade in the city. They just wanted to stop in and look at virtual Santa in the window.

So this girl is part of the biggest Christmas event in the city and appears with real Santa every night, but she had to stop in to see virtual Santa. We hadn't realised just how powerful that $22.95 download would be. It's certainly a huge hit with the kids.

One of the neighbours kids, who's about 11 or 12 said to me last night, there's a projector behind there isn't there? I said yes, just don't tell your little sister. He said no worries. Took him a week to figure it out, but he got there in the end.
 

logandc99

Dedicated elf
Joined
Jul 13, 2012
Messages
1,153
Ah, it's a digital age we live in where virtual Santa is better than real Santa.
:)
But look at it this way, this little girl is in a Christmas show which no doubt has lights and decorations and a "real" Santa and she still wants to specially stop and look at your lights! It says a lot about how good your display is I think.
 

Boof63

Senior elf
Joined
Nov 7, 2011
Messages
585
Location
Kadina
great effort, shows you what it is really about, the kids enjoyment.
Suffering from C.l.a.p. envy!!!
cheers Boof63 :D
 

MY03VY

New elf
Joined
Sep 7, 2012
Messages
11
Thanks for all the kind comments guys.


As the driving force behind getting all this stuff actually going blinky flashy twinkle, it certainly means alot hearing it from here that it impresses. Reading the comments from people with hundred + channels saying that it looks great is refreshing.


It was a MASSIVE effort coming into this from basically doing maybe 15 mins of research on the topic last year, to getting the green light in August that we were doing it, and then having to make it all happen. It was an insanely steep learning curve. Which at times resulted in meltdown on my part... for example our second night epic vixen failure that resulted in going to X-Lights to control the shows and haven't looked back since.


2 weeks ago if you asked me to modify a sequence I'd have probably reacted with a steady flow of four letter words, but I've since written another one, modified stuff, and even playing with existing sequences.... the bug has bitten.


I love the look on kids faces when they're dancing around the front yard. That is also justification for the countless hours of work that went into it all.


Again, thanks for all the comments guys. I hope to try and get a better video than the first effort and put something together in iMovie.
 
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