Makers,

I'm wanting to gauge interest in this, it's a bit far, but if Lasers are your thing it extremely cool. My friend Ron (Maker extraordinaire) owns a lot of laser gear, and does laser shows as a very serious side business. These are large tube lasers some full color, some not, with automated controls animation the whole nine yards. The lasers are up to 20 watts, and for this setup the big Argon gets hard stopped into a mountain a few miles away, (well the highest point in WI, this is the Midwest and Mountains are pretty scarce) This requires FAA clearance BTW, so this is not just playing with lasers on a whim, it involves close to a week of setup and planing.

So the question to the group, would you be interested in traveling ~2 1/2 hours into central WI to get a behind the scenes tour of the lasers, automated lighting, show control toys? ( My intention would be to stay the night in a cheap motel there, as you can't play with everything until dark )

Ron's very personable, and would love to field questions about any and everything involved in the setup. The event is a Halloween haunted corn field, and is a benefit for a place that collects historic farm buildings (yes buildings) for preservation and educational purposes. I'll dig up the website and add it.

Let me know if there is interest, and I'll get possible dates (all very near Halloween)

Pete

sounds pretty effin cool. i'd nuke my schedule to try to make it.

pedro

If I can work it out with the family, I'd like to go! Would kids be welcome as well?

Kids, depending on age would certainly be welcome. The Haunted Corn Maze itself is pretty scary, there's a less scary one, earlier in the day I think. Here's the link about the event itself. My kids went last year and had a blast doing the maze, and "helping" run the laser animation show. They were 9 and 11 at the time.

-- If you want to do the actual trip through the maze there is some waiting involved. It's a huge local attraction, and many hundreds of people show up --

I'm verifying if this will work and trying to get a link to some pictures from years past.

Pete

yes, probably, depending on my work schedule.

interested, schedulign might be tricky, but show control and robotic lighting is a bucket of fun (used to do programming for it at my old job)

Update:

So the latest is that the Haunted Corn Maze folks are a bit behind on their planning. The big laser and various moving lights will be in use, however the Laser animation etc, may not happen. They were in a tent last year, and the weather was not cooperating. So I'll let you know more on the total setup when I do. Ron's happy to give everyone a tour of whatever the setup may be.

Here's part of the inside Haunted Corn Maze Laser show from two years ago, [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8nYltXxKD0]and some behind scenes of the outdoor laser etc[/url]

Here's a behind the scenes look at the Laser Animation etc, of the annual Christmas Lights at the Garage.

Pete

So the laser animation and other fun show control sync stuff wont be happening this year. I'm thinking we should plan a trip when we can see all the toys, and perhaps indoors.

Sorry

Pete