making some arches

[Jdwagner888]

hey fellas im making some arches this year. (4)

and i want to find all of the possible cool animations i can do with them.

does anyone have a sample sequence with just different arch jumps and effects? because so far all i can do with them is jump and randomize. lol


thankyou everyone!

[rstehle]

HERE (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJgOi2kOS3M&feature=relate) is a Youtube video that shows some of the cool things you can do with leaping arches. HERE (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55ob5fIwMgs) is another one...........

[dirknerkle]

hey fellas im making some arches this year. (4)
and i want to find all of the possible cool animations i can do with them.


Hmmmm... with 4 arches, and maybe 10 strings each of three colors per arch, that's 120 strings/120 channels....

The possibile number of sequences for 120 individual channels is wayyyyyyy beyond a human's ability to analyze in a lifetime. :rolleyes: Just build 'em and have fun thinking of the possibilities... You'll never use them all up.

[BF210]

The possibile number of sequences for 120 individual channels is wayyyyyyy beyond a human's ability to analyze in a lifetime.

It's not quite that bad - most combinations of lights are not artistically useful. It's more like ballet: there is a vocabulary, and a few basic variations, but nothing that looks like a game of "Twister" played by monkeys on speed. I'd suggest looking at old movies with massive production numbers, such as "42nd Street" or the water ballet sequences in a typical Esther Williams film from the 40's and 50's.

Watch the chorus line, not the stars. You'll see three basic variations: A) everyone doing the same thing, B) doing something one after another, and C) dividing into groups and doing A) or B).

Thinking about arches again, there are only a few moves in the vocabulary.
A) Single segment chase from one end to another - a jump
B) As above, but segments behind remain lit, like opening a lady's fan
C) Doing A or B from both ends to the middle
D) As C, starting in the middle and moving to the ends
E) Multi-segment chase, like theater lights or marching ants
F) As A-E, with dark segments on a lit background
G) Multi-segment random twinkle
H) Random fade/dissolve on or off
I) Treat as a single string and dim or flash all segments together.

Music repeats patterns, so do moves. Once you have a certain move in the tempo of the song, you can repeat it (copy/paste) as the music repeats, possibly in the opposite direction. Don't use every move in every song; some will fit the mood better than others. You'll probably have a song or two that don't need the arches at all. The chorus line isn't in every scene of the movie, is it?

Happy sequencing!
(yet another Don)

[love2cad]

Cool... thanks for the ideas. I'm about to build some arches myself.. this is so much fun!!!