Wow! How is this done??

[swamidog]

what's the rpm range? this is all very interesting.

I want to echo what Steve said. I know all that Barney went through to prove his concept. The actual rotation of the prism took some daunting engineering. He finally resorted to having a custom, PLL motor engineered by a PHD engineering professor on the East Coast. This is one reason I'm interested in seeing "the bearings." I know Barney tried all sorts of drive arrangements and ultimately the only thing that worked was the hollow rotor method driving the prism directly. I suppose some modern commercial motor like the one pictured could be used.

Attachment 31283

Unfortunately, from my research, it seems this technology got scrapped in the liquidation of his laser estate. That isn't to say it can't be reproduced.

And as stated, it's not a simple matter of lining things up and lighting things up ... synchronization is VERY critical ... and the system has to be extremely robust given the speeds, and torque required. The apparatus can end up being quite bulky.

Beyond the mechanics of the rotation of the prism, I want to emphasize again that the other key component to the system was the variable diffusion. This could be done quite well today if we actually had a digital beam brush on the market. I know Bill was working on one in 2009 ... what ever happened to that?

As you may have figured out by now, I am a purest. I wouldn't undertake making this "Music Visualizer" again strictly as a cool effect. This was a deep intellectual endeavor for Barney in his life-long passion to visualize music. If I were in the position to, I would pick up his baton and finish his race for him.

[dsli_jon]

..What is the difference between aluminum coated, uncoated and VIS O coated?

Alum-coated would have one or more faces 'internally' first-surface mirrored, to channel the beam-path, w/o any 'escape'... uncoated, has no A/R-coating, and that 'VIS 0' is a very-high efficiency A/R-coating, (..about on-par with the famous 'CDAR' windows they sell / we love..) but it's peak-efficiency, is with 'VIS-ible wavelengths (..as opposed to super-low UV or far-IR, etc..) at '0'-degrees 'incidence' (..angle the beam / light is passing thru it..)

..so, you'd (most-likely) want one with the VIS-0 option.. however, I don't know *if*, perhaps, these kaleido-peeps indeed-are using an 'internally-mirrored' one... in such a case, you'd want 'mirrored + VIS-0', I'd think...

RE: 'graduated diffusers'.. Yep, look-somewhat 'fresnel'-lookin.. the 'key to the magic' is... 'no rules' and... *experiment*.. ie: a while back, we were messin around takin some pix for those Purelight sales-posts, and... shooting a machida - thru a machida - if that was *rotated*??? Talk about an 'acid-trip'...

..Sir Vidal-Wolf was also introduced to the mezmerizing-world of the 'burn wheel'... Creates these mindblowing 'vortexes' and 'supernova-fx'.. just... just.. stuff you just really-cannot 'describe' the full-beauty / awesomeness-of, in pics / video.... which is exactly why Laserium-exploded... nothin like seeing the stuff live, and - performed.

j

[mixedgas]

That looks very much like a hollow shaft motor for a air bearing scanner.
ie Lincoln Laser or similar.

Not so sure what I have is exactly that fast.

Another trick is a molten lumia cell. Not quite sure I ever learned exactly what was in that heated glass cell.

Steve

[Earthnik]

"Barney was a good guy - fond memories. There's some video floating around on one of my old tapes with some of his
kaleidoscopic effects. I'll see if I can find it."

Please do so everyone can see what we're talking about. Watch for drool!

[laserist]

There's some scan through going on, but mostly it's what we used to call color mod & some very nice geometric images. At at least one point there were playing with 3D geometrics being rotated. Not really any chopper (some strobing) but mostly it just looked like maybe space between adjacent beams feeding the scanner(s). Nice job.

[Bradfo69]

@Steve - I think you meant Lightworld, not "Laserworld".

O.k., dove prism bought.

I'm now sitting with a polysector 20, a machado grating (different purpose), and a motor/controller combination in my spectrabeam.de shopping cart. Anything else at this point?

[planters]

I am having trouble finding the source for those super D. gratings any advice?

[laserist]

I am having trouble finding the source for those super D. gratings any advice?

http://www.creativelaser.de/hardware...y20sector.html

[Displaser]

I am having trouble finding the source for those super D. gratings any advice?

Peter at Creative Laser can be difficult to contact (lots of good info on the website). As Brad mentions, Spectrabeam has the gratings too.

I've dealt with Spectrabeam before - good communications, good products & good service from Berndt and his staff.

[Picasso]

Medialas also sells the whole line of "Lightworld Gratings" same price as getting it direct.