Lets go retro.

[Clive Mitchell]

Bet this brings back memories for the 40 plus generation.

http://tinyurl.com/fbx8n

It's a French lighting thread (so just look at the pictures if you can't
parle francais). Plenty of pictures of the old school discotheque
lighting equipment.

How many shocks and bruises did we get off that stuff!

 

[Clive Mitchell]

In any case, I think you better speak for yourself. I never had an
affinity for teenage rock parties, myself. I did help my cousin once or
twice set up his lighting strobo and blacklight equipment for one of
his parties, when we were 14, though. So yeah, I DID attend his party,
but only because: 1) I wanted to see people under my Philips HPW 125W
and 2) I liked one girl who was there

I used to install and service the stuff in night clubs. Usually as
"homers" in the evening....

I knew a club owner who had a complete obsession with the lights so he
got them from everywhere in varying states of repair, and I fixed 'em
and put them onto a huge grid-shaped lighting truss.

Most exciting incident was when I was trying to get a smoke damaged
flying saucer going. It had been in a night club fire and all the slip
rings were corroded with the plastic laden smoke associated with disco
inferno's. The club had just opened and I was on a pair of steps on the
dance floor trying to clean the lamps slip rings as the lamp was
flickering as it rotated. I decided that the easiest way to clean the
heavily corroded slip-rings was to run the lamp head motor and simply
wipe the rings with very fine sand paper as it rotated. Obviously I
turned the lamp off before doing this.. Except that when I decided to
get a nice shine on the slip-rings by spitting on the sand paper and
reapplying it to the rings I discovered that the 240V lamp was switched
on the neutral! Ouch!

 

[[email protected]]

It's a French lighting thread (so just look at the pictures if you can't
parle francais). Plenty of pictures of the old school discotheque
lighting equipment.

Perhaps I'm a little too young and the equipment I'm thinking of came
along later than the stuff at that link, but most all of it appears to
have incandescent lamps. Nothing that can me frapper avec ces rayons
laser.

Matt Roberds

 

[Clive Mitchell]

Perhaps I'm a little too young and the equipment I'm thinking of came
along later than the stuff at that link, but most all of it appears to
have incandescent lamps. Nothing that can me frapper avec ces rayons
laser.

It did tend to be mostly incandescent. The only deviation from that was
the odd fixture that used lamps like HMI 575's which were mind numbingly
expensive then.

In those days they used absolutely every type of powerful lamp they
could find. A popular choice for flat beam effects in some flying
saucers and "Derby" effects was the humble linear 500W floodlight lamp.
Instead of being operated horizontally as usually specified for this
lamp, it was spun around to the beat in front of a bank or dome of
coloured lenses to create multiple synchronised flat beams of coloured
light. (Actually the projected image of the filament). Despite all
this spinning the lamps lasted for ages and only cost a couple of
dollars to replace. Not bad given the normal cost of projection lamps.

Even given the relatively wasteful nature of the humble moonflower
effect where a parabolic dish of mirrors reflects a series of images of
a halogen filament lamp out of a lens, the visual effect from even a
modestly powered lamp is very good.

I used to service SGM plus lights for a friend. These were a mutha of a
moonflower with an HMI 575 inside and large dichroic semaphores raised
and lowered by motors. It also had a three axis mirror on the front and
was so sharp and powerful that many thought it was a laser.

I wonder who invented the moonflower.

 

[[email protected]]

I wonder who invented the moonflower.

A couple of quick Googles don't say, and Wackypedia doesn't know. I
guess it could have been invented any time since the late 1800s, when
you could get electric lamps, electric motors, and colored filters
(stained glass) in the same place at once. After that I'd guess the
1920s or so, when electric motors got smaller and less expensive, and
then whenever colored plastics that could stand being next to a hot
lamp came about - 1950s maybe?

Matt Roberds

 

[TKM]

A couple of quick Googles don't say, and Wackypedia doesn't know. I
guess it could have been invented any time since the late 1800s, when
you could get electric lamps, electric motors, and colored filters
(stained glass) in the same place at once. After that I'd guess the
1920s or so, when electric motors got smaller and less expensive, and
then whenever colored plastics that could stand being next to a hot
lamp came about - 1950s maybe?

Matt Roberds

Maybe it came out of the color organ technology that was popular in the
1920s and which reappeared in the 1960s when solid state electronic controls
became available.

I remember being fascinated by a color organ display at the Museum of Modern
Art in NYC about 30 years ago. It featured a device called a "Clavilux"
invented by Thomas Wilfred. The technology was quite simple -- a beam of
light, color filters and wadded up pieces of aluminum foil to project color
patterns on a large screen. A slow rotating speed (probably by a clock
motor) kept the audience interested as little "buds" of light slowly
unfolded into light "flowers" and other patterns. I recall that someone in
the room referred to it as "fireworks in slow motion". That particular
display had no musical accompaniment. It didn't need any; the light
patterns were inspiring especially for a novice lighting person. I must
have spent a couple of hours just watching the thing.

There's information and some interesting links at:
http://www.gis.net/~scatt/clavilux/clavilux.html

Terry McGowan