Thread: Magical Fireflies

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I'm probably doing a swamp theme this year and I really wanted to try to get some fireflies going. I've seem this product called Magical Fireflies but I noticed you can't return the product once it's opened.

Has anyone had any experience using this guys?

http://www.magicalfireflies.com/

Thanks!

We used them in our haunt 2 years ago....You might consider making them and save yourself quite a bit of money. The Magical Fireflies design uses LED's tied to very small computer fans.

Other designs use LED's or Rice Lights simply blown by a good size fan or blower motor.

Here is a link to firefly projects
http://www.hiddenmickeys.org/Imagine...gineering.html

Those are cool.

[now trying to think of a spot they will fit into my vampire theme...]

There are a couple of threads on the EFX-TEK forum about making this with a prop-1 and some LEDs.

jimmy, you can make a form of fireflies really cheap just by taping an LED to one side of a 2"x2" piece of black cardboard. The cardboard is attached to a long and skinny piece of speaker wire and the wire hangs from a tree or fishing lines streched across the yard. I've seen one person power them with a watch battery taped to the other side of the cardboard and painted black with only the tiny wires sticking through the cardboard, and another used AA batteries at the other end of the speaker wire. Put an occilating fan pointing at the fireflies and when the cardboard spins and flutters, it gives the appearance of real fireflies

If I were smart enough to have read all the posts, I would have realized someone posted a link to these same directions.....sorry.

$80 bucks seems a little much for something you can make yourself for a lot less money.

I have several sets of the firefies and I've made a variety of my own. It seems for me that it all depends on the application. The Firelies brand must be hung from trees and whatnot. Which looks great if they are in the distance and out of reach of the TOTs/guests. And they DO wear out/get stuck and are GREEN (!? Motion-sick fireflies?)

I prefer the single ones that I've made out of stiff wire I stick in the ground. I can control them easier and with batteries put them out and about in the yard etc.

The hardest part was getting the light to behave realistically in a slow but random throbbing pattern where each one is independent from the others. I have tried using capacitors and a Prop-1 but the prop-1 is so difficult to get working right. Plus all the WIRE needed! The best solution I found was these: http://store.qkits.com/moreinfo.cfm/FK143. The light sensitive ones (on only at night) will save batteries.

I use a 3 ft length of steel spring wire then run a 24 gauge wire to the bulb. I mount the bulb at the top of the wire with heat shrink tubing then heat shrink the entire length with the qkit near the bottom with a 3v power supply (sometimes batteries). The steel wire acts as one conductor and the 24 gauge as the other - makes for a very thin design. Then I put the power supply/batteries elsewhere. Even with just a slight breeze they look great. They just stick in the ground wherever I want them. The design is based on the POTC ones which I have actually seen up close in a "behind the scenes" tour. This is essentially how they made theirs.

I have several versions using both LED and incandescent blubs (the bulb that comes with the Qkit). The LED's don't really work because they are not diffused enough and their color is either too yellow or too green. The incandescent looks just like the fireflies I remember as a kid. It'd be interesting to try this with red or blue LED's or even with DMX controllable ones to create any color - OOoo... or 5w LED's to create flashes! All kinds of ideas once you have control!

Anyway, for the ones I made after touching up the bulb with some yellow and orange Sharpie coloring they look great!

I have used a few different products http://www.fireflymagic.com is my favorite. Works great!

I manufacture Zen Fireflies with my partner, Mark. We have a huge following of people that "do it up" for Halloween. Our electronic fireflies lights are great because they are the only ones that actually MOVE-definitely adds the scary factor.
Kim