2007
While
the display was up in 2006, I started to read on-line
about animating light displays and by the time the
holidays were over, I had decided to make this my
focus for 2007. By February I was starting to think
about what elements I was going to add to my display
to animate and what music I would use. I was spending
most of my free time investigating different ideas
for the display and learning about the equipment necessary
to synchronize my light display, as well as listening
to Christmas music.
By
May, I had decided to go with 128 channels (of light synchronization),
and 3 songs. Key elements I was planning to create included:
thirty, 6 foot mini trees, each with 2 colors; 150, 100watt
flood lights, red, green, and gold, to encircle the pond;
14, 500watt halogen lights; and 22 strobe lights, including
a 750watt mega strobe. A lot of what I was planning was
centered on delivering my vision for the song that most
inspired me – U2’s, ‘City of Blinding
Lights’ (COBL). To create the mini trees, I found
some 4 and ½ foot tomato cages at a local store and
while making these with my kids, I had another good idea!
Using the tomato cages we could make giant stars to hang
on the cable! So that I could put 2 colors on each stars,
and make each ‘starpoint’ controllable, I needed
12 additional channels for each star. This, and some other
ideas we had, forced me to increase the number of channels
from 128 to 192 and this was without any experience on sequencing
the music.
In
June, when LOR had their annual sale, I purchased
the necessary equipment and software, and began sequencing
music. I started with ‘COBL’. At this
time, I was hopeful I could do 3 songs in total and
my two other choices were Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s,
‘The Mad Russian’, and Celtic Woman’s,
‘Carol of the Bells’. Once I realized
I was going to be able to finish these songs well
in advance, I started to listen to Christmas music
and began queuing songs for future sequencing. In
July, Daniel asked if he could sequence a song. On
a long drive to Rochester, listening to Christmas
music, he picked out Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s,
‘The Lost Christmas Eve’. We got him set
up on a computer and he began working on this song.
I didn’t have high expectations for him as I
thought it would be quite challenging for him and
I could only describe to him what I thought the display
was going to look like. He finished his song in November,
with absolutely no assistance from me. I set-up a
mini display with 1 giant star, and 15 of the mini
trees in the basement so that I could see how my sequencing
was working out.
Realizing
how much we had to do, we started setting up parts
of the static display on weekends in October. Emily,
Daniel, John, and Grace were all helping out significantly
and this was now truly a family project. Brian returned
about 1 week before Thanksgiving and each day, from
sun-up to sun-down, we were out assembling the display.
We finished on Wednesday and started to test the hardware.
Miraculously, everything worked! We finished with
116,115 lights and 21 songs for the show. And Daniel’s
song, turned out to be one of my favorites!
|
Emily's
Light Video
2008
Preparations
See
All the Videos On YouTube
Song
List
|
)
)
)
)
)
)