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While I love the idea of adding a spatial filter and corrective optics, adding more elements to the optical train would add complexity to alignment for sure. But, to homogenize the beams, this would be a great way to do. I was just hoping for something better to exist. Don't get me wrong,...

Design/adjust the individual diode collimators to have the same divergence. Mix the the beams, run the mix through an apochromatic spatial filter with a input aperture to limit the incoming superimposed beam diameters to the smallest present and then through the spatial filter aperture to clean up...

Constant tweaks of alignment aside, the thing that really sparked this was Pangolin's Beam Bush. It's such an awesome looking tool until you see the different beam profiles exaggerated by the Beam Brush optics. Now, I'm sure in some instances, that effect is cool but I would rather see one...

I love Les's videos! Great stuff!!

Adam, Thank you for the kind words. I have you on the list for one. Chris

:D:D:D:D:D:D:D Gas lasers for life, lol! Adam

I am *very* grateful that you take the time to make these available, Chris. As for the price, I seem to recall that the first year you made these I suggested you charge a bit more for your time, considering all the effort that goes into making them. Back then, you said that you wanted to keep...

The problem is the strict US Regulations governing laser products and laser light shows. This adds cost and legal liability to any public laser display. The projector itself must be certified compliant under a laser product manufacturer's variance (which is rather painstaking), and then you...

I'm in! Well not positive I can make it, but paid. Sorry I'm late! Medium shirt please. -David

... search for "quantum-dot-lasers" :cool:

Such a diode does exist, it's a hot cathode gas filled device known as ion laser. Steve

Great conversation with lots of excellent feedback from Adam & absolom7691. FWIW to newcomers, here's my evolutionary experience since returning to the scene ~ 5 years ago. Back in the day, there were only ion gas lasers, mostly krypton, argon or a mixture of the 2. So, I wanted an inexpensive,...

Thanks, Steve! I can always count on you to pop my balloon with sound science! lol. I figured it was probably not feasible or not practical, otherwise LD manufacturers would probably be doing it. I would imagine such a diode would be great for miniaturizing light engines for all kinds of...

problem is the die-air interface IS the output coupler, and some of these have stacked strained quantum well layers for tuning/HR mirror etc. Might be possible but would require a MAJOR research effort to do so, probably easier to put combining optics into the housing at a micro scale. You...

Interesting - Thanks!

... some years ago I was developing applications with/for paste-dispensers for high viscous glues and pastes. With this you can "print" all sorts and sizes of lenses or "regular surfaces" ... now image, you'll print some of this with the previously mentioned "Acrifix 192", what will give perfect...

https://www.mcmaster.com/products/perforated-metal/aluminum-perforated-sheets-7/ Laser Images used to use perforated aluminum dipped in lacquer as standoffs with a "granite" art glass disk or as a disk with some other lumia disk for a nice effect. You dip the perforated part in the lacquer and...

Very interesting, Gang. As it happens, I was very impressed with these similarly described components from Live LaserSystems in Austria and recently purchased their: 4 * Sparrow diode assemblies w/TEC, 4 * ColorDrive One + TEC diode drivers, 1 * EMS8000 galvos w/drivers Plus optics & mounts...

mesh | McMaster-Carr Mesh disks, stainless steel, look up Ronchi Ruling and find a diffraction calculator on-line. There is a limit on how fine you can go, but can be um, interesting at short range. Two plastic sheet gratings crossed to each other on motors is the transmission version of...

Taking a pointer to a stained glass shop can be a fun half hour. Aim at the ceiling. Problem is, its not well annealed, so making discs is an art form and drilling it is tough. Using a brass tube as a drill with abrasive powders, ie wet (water and detergent) 30,60,200 corundum or silicon carbide...

... a hint for transparent glue - here in Germany I'm using "Acrifix 192" for glueing/fusing Plexiglas ... it's curing to pure PMMA, so too usable for "optical chaos" sheets :cool: Viktor

Great tips. Thanks. For the lenticular FX we've ordered a couple of different small sheets from these folks we discovered on line to try out. www.vicgi.com They sell small quantities at reasonable prices. Time will tell it it works or not. Cheers, Craig

Thanks, yes, sounds like fun. We've played around a bit with that. It's cool, also the old airplane glue etc for lumia FX. Craig

Yes, I've talked to John on the phone and his module looks great, it's very sophisticated, and we may go that route down the line. We got a couple of the basic OPT versions before we knew about John's stuff and we'd like to customize those first probably. Thanks, Craig

... you'll get all sort of weird and funny "optical" stuff, when placing pieces of PMMA or other transparent thermoplastic materials ontop of elcetronic coolers, wire-meshes or other regular (or irregular too) structured metal surfaces into an oven and heating them at 120 to 140 centigrades (PMMA...

You could just buy the whole thing from Technological Artisans, John has a module with two steppers and a DMX controller that fits in front of a scanhead. Steve