Strakers Lightscreen behind his desk

I have a question, anyone know how they made that light screen behind
Strakers desk that changes colors? I was thinking of making one in 3D
studiomax and then exporting the video for a screen saver. But sorta
need to know how the prop was built in real life so I can duplicate
the effect in the 3d world to match it up exactly and put in in a
loop for the screen saver.


John

CONTENTS DELETED

Hi All,
I just tend to lurk on this list but this subject is something
I do know a little about having made these way back in my art
student days of bright colours and "grooooovy" music, shows you
just how old I am!.<g>

You need to make yourself a lightbox the size of the screen you
want and anything up to 6 inches or so deep. The front screen
could be anything translucent even fabric but sheet plastic preferably.
Inside your lightbox and behind the screen you now need to
construct 1,2 or 3 pattern projectors, these were usually low wattage
light bulbs around which were placed cylinders more often than not
made out of tinfoil and into which had been pierced small holes,
slots and shapes. If you used 2 cylinders on a generator one would
be static and fitted around the light source the other would be
suspended from a small electric clock motor's minute hand drive shaft
so that it was located either inside or outside the fixed cylinder,
you could add colour with a few pieces of floodlight cells stuck
to the inside of one or both cylinders.

If you _really_ wanted to be _with-it_ you could add a few low
voltage bulbs and filters and hook those up to your "record player"
with a spare amp, switch out the lights sit back and be entertained
by an early Floyd track or two.

Best Regards
Neil.

PS. We also used to put together those coloured blob things you
could project onto the walls, all you needed was a few round glass
sheets and spacers, stack theses anything up to 4-6 deep, glue
up with epoxy and part fill with dyed glycerine, again we used low
geared motors to build little heath-robinson cell carriers that
could rotate the "blob cells" in the converted slide projectors,
totally bonkers really but fun at the time.

----- Original Message -----
From: <[hidden email]>


> I always thought it was based on that Christmas tree light wheel gadget
that
> revolves. But I'm not certain. I'd really be interested in what you come
up
> with though, I always really did like Straker's light mural.

Just wanting to second that!
:-)
And say hello and welcome to the new people on the list!

--Anny

Neil,

is there any chance of a drawing. I'm having a bit of trouble picturing
the whole gizmo.
I'd love to make one.

regards
Chris

Neil Morris wrote:

>You need to make yourself a lightbox the size of the screen you
>want and anything up to 6 inches or so deep.

On Fri, 24 Aug 2001 at 21:40:22 Chris Avis <[hidden email]> wrote:

> is there any chance of a drawing. I'm having a bit of trouble picturing
> the whole gizmo.
> I'd love to make one.

It seems to me that the actual method was much cruder than Neil Morris's
elegant 6"-thick light box. If my memory of what I read somewhere serves
me correctly, it consisted of diffused translusive panel serving as a rear
screen projection target for colored projection pattern in a circular drum.
The projector resided within the drum and rotated at a very slow pace.

You can verify whether this assumption is correct by checking the direction
of movement in an episode of UFO. If all images move in the same
direction, then a single projector is in use. But if there are two
different patterns of rotation, or if the elements on the screen change
shape as they traverse across the screen, then I am probably incorrect.

Jeff Kuzma

Hi Chris,
I think it's time this stuff came round again, just got
a new bottle for my old lava lamp a few months back<BG>.

Never made any drawings back then I'm afraid, we just made
it up as we went along with what we had to hand, 2nd hand
speaker cabs were useful ready made type boxes to work
with, take out the front speaker baffle and replace it with
white perspex.

If you'll leave it with me a while I'll see if I can jot
down a drawing or two, scan them and forward to you via direct
email.

Another hint for anyone else out there having a bash at
making one of these, if you use clear light bulbs not the
frosted pearl type, any small holes in the foils used on
the projectors act as pinhole lens so the shape of the bright
bulbs filament can get projected onto the screen at odd and
distorted angles this could add greatly to the overall dramatic
effect.

Best Regards
Neil.

>Jeff Kuzma <[hidden email]>
>You can verify whether this assumption is correct by checking the direction
>of movement in an episode of UFO. If all images move in the same
>direction, then a single projector is in use. But if there are two
>different patterns of rotation, or if the elements on the screen change
>shape as they traverse across the screen, then I am probably incorrect.

Jeff,
Just watched several eps in a row and the patterns always go in one
direction. Looks like you could be right!
Denise

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