Innovative Christmas Light Setups?

glitch0 asks: "Recently, I found some pretty neat Christmas decorations, at a neighbors house. He has a light setup that syncs up with MIDI files of Christmas music. The cool part is the way you hear the music - it's broadcast using a radio transmitter so you can tune your car radio as you're driving by and hear and see the show. Do any other Slashdot readers have cool homebrew light setups or ideas for over-the-top holiday decorations?"

recently I saw video online

[doorbender]

http://www.thatvideosite.com/view/1225.html [thatvideosite.com]display using a low power fm transmitter to broadcast music (it was originally on TLC or DISC) I was interested in what the controllers that interfaced with a PC were called so I could look on google for parts suppliers myself.

Re:recently I saw video online

[Gulthek]

More info on the famous Christmas lights video [snopes.com].

Includes an interview with the guy by a local radio station.

Re:recently I saw video online

[antdude]

Good find. I liked the other video and the podcast audio.

Re:recently I saw video online

[mwvdlee]

Isn't your neighbor afraid the RIAA is going to sue him for broadcasting music?

live band

[doorbender]

The setup I saw on TLC or Discovery channel had a live band that played in the garage. (or at least thats what he told and showed the cameras)

Re:live band

[Greg@UF]

The music is Trans-Siberian Orchestra's "Wizard in Winter" from The Lost Christmas Eve album.

And I agree with you - it's very cool !

expertise

[doorbender]

thanks for the link Gulthek

it led me here http://computerchristmas.com/index.phtml?link=how_ to&HowToId=4&LowLimit=0 [computerchristmas.com]

a picture of it complete.
http://computerchristmas.com/tmp/myimages/4-comple te2.jpg [computerchristmas.com]
it'll controll 8 circuits per port hehehe

Simpler is better?

[lpangelrob]

This is me and my wife's first Christmas in our new house, so naturally, we're excited. I'm also lazy, so the entire content of our Christmas decorating consists of six strings of all white, not flashing lights. Our neighbor has about 45 lighted penguins out on the lawn, which is both tacky and an awesome way to promote Linux if one chose to do so.

The problem with more lights is that no one ever really takes the time to make lots of lights look good. No, icicle lights don't automatically make everything look better.

Re:Simpler is better?

[Morgalyn]

I second that complaint. I'm so tired of people lighting up the entire neighborhood with countless strands of tacky multicolored lights just strewn about in no pattern or reasonable fashion. There is one house down the street that looks like they just threw the lights at their bushes and then plugged them in. Tacky!

When I was growing up there was one street near where we lived where everyone was retired, and they competed every year for the most impressive christmas displays. They were always tasteful

Re:Simpler is better?

[unlabeledchick]

What would be good, is a penguin fighting a borg drone, or Darth Vader... or some corporate bastard...

Countdown

[MullerMn]

Countdown till that fuckknuckle with the zillion Christmas lights starts pimping his website.. He does it on stories that have nothing to do with Christmas. He'll probably collapse in a foaming heap of excitement when he sees this one.

5.. 4.. 3.. 2..

Re:Countdown

[Atzanteol]

And a Merry Christmas to you too! Nothing like Christmas cheer... :-)


And for any Boston liberals, please replace "Christmas" with "Holiday" or "Kwanza" at your discretion.

Re:Countdown

[KilobyteKnight]

And a happy/sad/neutral winter/summer holiday/regular-day season/time-of-year to you/you-and-yours too/also.

How does that commercial go??

[technoextreme]

And for any Boston liberals, please replace "Christmas" with "Holiday" or "Kwanza" at your discretion.

Have a happy chrismkwazakah.

Re:How does that commercial go??

[onkelonkel]

Merry Christmas and Happy Chewbacca!

This house

[rute20740]

Here's a good example of someone that's got a pretty innovative, and extremely elaborate setup: http://70.85.89.52/~hedonist/videos/christmas_hous e.wmv [70.85.89.52]

Try to top this...

[anhyzer_mush]

This is waaaayyyy over the top. It's about 2-3 minutes long.

http://monke.undeadclan.com/Wizards_of_Winter_-_SM .wmv [undeadclan.com]

Neo-traditional

[tverbeek]

Mine don't blink.

The pulse of ... slashdot?

[stienman]

Google: christmas light display. [google.com] The first two links are directly relevant, and nearly all of them relate to exactly this question.

Yeah, sure, I imagine that there's a small percentage of slashdot users that really go all out on christmas displays, but what are you really after here? If you want to see cool ways to do displays, Slashdot isn't the best forum to ask, and if you are interested in the best display, why ask in a less effective forum?

Reminds me of Charlie and the Chocolate factory, "And you - well, you're just lucky [to get your story posted], aren't you?"

-Adam

Whatever you do

[antifoidulus]

avoid an animated goatse man christmas lights display....

You don't see these in shops

[msmikkol]

A friend of mine built this [melkein.com] to get into christmas spirit.

A quick summary for those few who don't read Finnish: It's not a neon tube, but a electroluminescent element they use for pimping out computer cases. The picture was taken in a dark room with a Canon Ixus 500, 1 s exposure and ISO 50 sensitivity.

Re:You don't see these in shops

[Soulfarmer]

No, it doesn't mean anything in finnish, so I wrote that in english on my xmas-lights.

And to the parent's parent, this was a suprise to my bandwidth ;) No harm done though.

No ligth at all

[denisbergeron]

Stop destroyig the planet !
Close the ligth this Christmas to give some breath to you children.

Musical outdoor Christmas lights on a house!

[antdude]

See the cool video at Compfused [compfused.com] or Stupid Videos [stupidvideos.com].

sour grapes

[doorbender]

I notice that the video I topically posted with FIRSTPOST has been redundantly posted in excess of 4 times and in two of these instances they are recieving a higher mod than my first post.

{/Grump}

Why fiddle with exotic christmas light setups?

[Centurix]

I just have one fucking huge bulb attached to a bayonet I installed on the top of my house. When that sucker lights up it's the equivalent of living above the arctic circle. 24 hours of daylight baby!

Re:Why fiddle with exotic christmas light setups?

[Poeir]

Mind your neighbor doesn't make a Burns sun-blocker.

Small Town Light Display

[Mumbly_Joe6432]

Every year, my hometown has a huge light display including deer jumping over the road, santa, jesus, and all the other children's Christmas characters. Oh, and Hannukah. I'm sure you've all seen this before. They also broadcast a short range signal with Christmas music just like "your neighbor" is. I thought it was a pretty good idea, but I find it hilariously over the top that your neighbor is broadcasting this himself.

That power bill must be killer....

[dacarr]

Here in southern California, popular displays include the decorated trees in San Marino, a particular mansion owned by an ice cream mogul in Pasadena, the Griffith Park display that is set up with various displays by the City of Los Angeles governments, and - my personal favorite - the homeowners of Naples Canals in Long Beach, who do up rather spectacular displays. One in particular involves a miniature roller coaster, and has been up since sometime in the 1980s. OK, so they're not innovative, but they'r

do 200 RGB LEDs w/microcontrollers on tree count?

[Miamicanes]

As it so happens, I'm taking a break right this moment from the project that's consumed most of my free time for the past month, and likely to consume substantially all of it for the next week and a half: a string of 50 serial-networked Atmel ATtiny2313 microcontrollers, each juggling 4 independent RGB LEDs (total cost, not including support and development hardware, ~$250). As soon as I'm convinced that the bootloader I'm (hopefully) finishing this weekend can, in fact, successfully re-flash the chips once

individual

[r00t]

Once you get the LEDs on the tree, accurately map out their physical location. Then project something simple onto it. I suggest a fractal cloud animation. You could to a Lava Lamp effect on the tree. Moving disks of color would work.