Thread: Glowing "hot" coals ...

Tweet

Here is what I have so far. Slow process due to limited time to work on project. It's just a basic 1x2 / 2x2 frame, faux brick paneling for sides and a beveled 2x4 top rail. Still need to do the lights, balls and foam. Of course other details are in the works for this. I'll create an album and post more pics as available.

Originally Posted by Flynn Manor

Great tutorial! I saw Goldies version as well, but your explanation was much much better. Can't wait t o give this a try. Two questions:
1.Are all the lights placed inside of the wiffle balls?
2. How do you prevent the Great Stuff from covering the lights completely?

1. No. I tried to put most of the lights inside the wiffles or the ping pong balls, but some are just hot glued in the open on the base board.
2. If you've used the foam in the past, you know it expands quickly after being sprayed. However, you can quickly learn to guage how much it will expand as you move the can over the surface of the prop at various speeds. My goal while spraying, was to make certain that man made shapes were changed to irregular shapes. Cover, at least, the round edges of the holes and use the foam to make the ball outlines irregular. Some of the lights not in the balls are not covered by the foam and some are. Changing the intensity of the lights with foam and paint adds to the effect, IMO.


To all of you,
My job keeps me very busy during the first part of the year, so I haven't been able to get back to the forum much in 2010. I'm surprised to see so many posts and views of this thread and humbled by the kind remarks from so many of you. At the same time, I'm proud to have contributed in some small way to your haunts and the any added enjoyment you and your visitors will experience as your builds surpass my humble example of this effect.

Again, thank you for the kind remarks.

Happy Haunts my friends.

LT

I wonder how well this idea would hold up to miniaturizing? My latest incarnation of Linus' Lament is gonna be 3'x3' corner piece with a 6"bulge in front. I want to have a JoL pot over a stove with this glowing coal method. Hmmm...Should be interesting. I'll post pics when I'm done.

Looks great!

Originally Posted by The Archivist

I wonder how well this idea would hold up to miniaturizing? My latest incarnation of Linus' Lament is gonna be 3'x3' corner piece with a 6"bulge in front. I want to have a JoL pot over a stove with this glowing coal method. Hmmm...Should be interesting. I'll post pics when I'm done.

IMO, the more random the lights blink, the more effective the prop.

The only issue you will likely encounter with shrinking the amount of the area of this affect is the fact that fewer lights can be used. You probably won't want to use the controller lights with the multi fuctions (affects). Those are usually 100-150 lights - that might be too many for the area you have available.

If you do use a controller light string you will have two chanllenges. First, you would have to leave the controller set to random flashing (it resets each time power is interupted) and still risk obvious patterning that would betray to prop.
Second, I strongly encourage multiple strings that are not on a single controller to avoid as pattern flashing as much as possible. JMHO

Anyone interested in building this, or something like it should take a look at ebay item# 110550042653.

100% BRAND NEW!
High Quality,
Durable indoor and outdoor decoration.
8 different ways of glimmering (combination,in waves,sequential,slo glo,chasing/flash,slow fade,twinkle,flash,steady on.)
Low power consumption: 7W. a
Total 100 LED bulbs.
Plug in to controller is 65cm in distance
Controller to the first led bulb is 25cm in distance
Total length: 10m
Color:Orange

Starting bid is $.99 !!

FWIW

Locating the lights to build this prop will be MUCH easier this year. I suggest you search all of ebay using the words "orange light string chasing" and check "Include title and description."

I had to use old style glass minilights last year. Looks like there are lots of controller orange LEDs this year. I might just have to make some more of these.

anyone have a video of this effect?

Originally Posted by LT Scare

Anyone interested in building this, or something like it should take a look at ebay item# 110550042653.



Starting bid is $.99 !!

FWIW

With shipping at $5.60. Made in China.

Thanks for posting this thread I saw this last year, but just haven't figured out how I'm going to apply it to my haunt. So happy to see all the different ideas in application.

I've been on the look out for inexpensive wiffle balls and am happy to report that the Dollar Tree has them (pack of 4) in the toy section.