Low Cost projector falling effect

Without building an expensive high powered or even expensive low powered laser light projector is there any way to create the illusion of something like falling snow? I have built a cheap laser that rotates currently but would like to build one with a snowflake diffraction lens. If I put that diffraction on the current design it would expand and contract but I am trying to figure out how to make it appear to fall like actual snow via internal physical parts, nothing digital on the inside, just using diffraction gratings, mirrors and gears.

Thanks,

Hew

HEW - did you really think thru the decision to make this your first thread?? plz back up a tad and make a nice intro of yrself in the WELCOME section - we like to help but also like good manners-
also a good idea to ad your general location in your profile= some Qs are not easy to answer if we have no idea where you live. and please add your date of birth - that is important and part of the terms of service we agree to. While we do not ever want to see a laser injurty its 10 times worse when a minor is involved- hope you iunderstand =


this may help=

For as cheap as 14$ usd ( all day at $20 & free ship) you can buy R/G China made GreedBay 'twinkle' lasers- as close as your budget will take you.= they do have one that makes an image that looks like a snow flake = like a spiro graph. and the DG will make that into as many more as you can stand- getting it to look like fallen snow is going to be hard.



With BEYOND & a galvo projector I can make or do lightning- clouds - palm trees swaying in the storm wind, god of thunder, etc there are 2000 cues that come with QS & Beyond.

but making an image that looked like falling snow will never happen w/o a 'real' PJ and some kind of soft=

lots to see and read at pangolin.com QS-BEYOND demos= tutorials all free=

spin a mirror-- hit it with your pointers and make some fog or smoke and try to be happy with 'Liquid Sky' and the 'Tunnel EFX'

:na::shhh:

I see no SNOW:san::san::san:
in your forecast:tsk:

GL:beer::beer:

hak

the hewmanoid said:

Without building an expensive high powered or even expensive low powered laser light projector is there any way to create the illusion of something like falling snow? I have built a cheap laser that rotates currently but would like to build one with a snowflake diffraction lens. If I put that diffraction on the current design it would expand and contract but I am trying to figure out how to make it appear to fall like actual snow via internal physical parts, nothing digital on the inside, just using diffraction gratings, mirrors and gears.

Thanks,

Hew

Click to expand...

Not in a cost effective manner. If you want Snowfall Aka Starfield you really need a pair of Galvos. Especially if you want "White" snow. Starfield is typically done with a outward expanding spiral scanned by the galvos. Random points moving in a given direction on the spiral are unblanked by the software, when that point range on the spiral is moving downward, it looks like snow.
Several spirals are scanned at once. There are other ways to compute it, but galvos are still needed.

Otherwise all you can get mechanically will be a row of falling dots from a linear grating scanned by a barrel mirror array. It looks NOTHING like snowflakes. Two barrels parallel to each other randomizes it somewhat, but the mechanical symmetry causes it to snow UP as well as Down, again, looking nothing like classical snow. The snowflakes fall on exactly the same paths as well. Real snow does not fall "straight" down and the eye picks up on this.

Starfields were so hard to do in the early years of laser shows that when software appeared to do it, it was banned from awards competitions, because everyone was SO happy to finally have it. Since everybody finally had it, it started showing up in every show. I had to pull the starfield out of my show submission, and I remember that well.

Snowflakes require a level of randomization that just does not appear in the mechanical world.

Steve

the hewmanoid said:

Without building an expensive high powered or even expensive low powered laser light projector is there any way to create the illusion of something like falling snow? I have built a cheap laser that rotates currently but would like to build one with a snowflake diffraction lens. If I put that diffraction on the current design it would expand and contract but I am trying to figure out how to make it appear to fall like actual snow via internal physical parts, nothing digital on the inside, just using diffraction gratings, mirrors and gears.

Thanks,

Hew

Click to expand...

I am a newb...but have something like this bigwise my wife got for me...
Howz bout a tiny rotating mirror ball?

This may sound funny- especailly to Sir Roberts- whose post was his usual expert opinion and spot-on.

One of the coolest animations that we get with Quick Show is the 'flying eagle' and its also one of the longest- hardly any flicker- whoever created it was a real pro-
A LaserShow company I know from San Diego 'Flew the eagle' in an empty big ass stadium for a boy scout event where all the scouts were camping on the feild


So what they did was , by hand Turn the entire PJ so the eagle flew around the seats - did its loops and flew back to the perch- so i tried this at a party and with a small Pjs its easy to move it by hand -- i did it with the humming bird and the dragon fly too- I can change the image size with a knob on the back= as low tech as it gets but lots of fun.

so you could buy a 150 $ sd card RGB with 5 K scanners - put jpeg pics or drawings onto the card and make your snow flakes fall 'by hand'

Rod's mirror ball is a good idea too


hak