What got you into lasers?

[Lazerjock]

Things keep matching up. Especially writing in script. Sounds like you saw their show.

Small laser world isn't it?

Back then many people had never seen a laser before so it was like shining a laser in front of a cat.

Lol!

[SpitzSTP]

You may have seen a show my Dad did then. He was a laserist for Laser Presentations Inc. for many years. They were based in Ohio but went to just about every state especially the east coast. They had an inflatable dome with bean bag chairs inside and did the fair circuit throughout the year. I was young when he was doing that, so I only have a few memories, but I do have very fond memories of him making the shows in the basement of our house and recording patterns on the reel to reel. When they did the shows the majority of the content was live, so no two shows were alike and the type of show you got depended on who was performing that night. So fair to say that is what got me pulled into lasers. They were always around, we never got rid of the equipment, and from time to time through out the years we pulled all the stuff out and played with it.

Very interesting! I have always wondered who did these travelling shows, in particular, ones I saw at the Texas State Fair circa 1978-79 having much to do with my interest in the artform to this very day. They had an inflatable dome on the fairway with bean bag chairs on the floor, and the projection equipment mounted up high on a platform constructed out of lumber situated directly underneath the apex, at the center. The guys running it were up in the tower. I recall the show material presented with hard-driving RNR and non-stop, all-of-the-stops-pulled-out abstracts. I used up all of my tickets on that one attraction, going back and watching it over and over again. I have LONG WONDERED who did these shows, what kind of equipment was used, and if anyone from that era is still around? Being 1979 I remember the first announcement being a request not to light up anything but as soon as the lights were dimmed of course that's pretty much what everyone did. Did any of these shows get archived to tape while they were being performed live? Does the company that did these shows still exist ? Does the analog box still exist? Sure would like to see pictures, if it does! I remember that all now like it was yesterday, hard to believe it was 35 years ago.

[lasermaster1977]

I started in laser shows in 1977 in Dallas. I knew Russell Rauch of Laser Presentations and believe I rented him my Coherent Radiation Mixed-Gas Laser when one of his lasers failed in the late 70's.
I got hooked in '76, enjoyed a career in it for 13 years. Still have a lot of my old stuff and am now reviving an old open and closed-loop galvo setup in my basement.

_________________________________
Everything depends on everything else

[SpitzSTP]

I started in laser shows in 1977 in Dallas. I knew Russell Rauch of Laser Presentations and believe I rented him my Coherent Radiation Mixed-Gas Laser when one of his lasers failed in the late 70's.
I got hooked in '76, enjoyed a career in it for 13 years. Still have a lot of my old stuff and am now reviving an old open and closed-loop galvo setup in my basement.

_________________________________
Everything depends on everything else

Welcome to PL, and thank you filling in the missing piece to a mystery that I have been trying to solve for many years about who did these fantastic Texas State Fair shows in the late 70's, that I remember so vividly. I have been asking around for a long time, until a friend on PL sent me a link to this thread the other day. Those were truly GREAT shows. I remember using all of my fair tickets to just see it over, over and over again. Perhaps that is also why I remember them so vividly? Absolutely stunning abstracts.

[lasermaster1977]

Welcome to PL, and thank you filling in the missing piece to a mystery that I have been trying to solve for many years about who did these fantastic Texas State Fair shows in the late 70's, that I remember so vividly. I have been asking around for a long time, until a friend on PL sent me a link to this thread the other day. Those were truly GREAT shows. I remember using all of my fair tickets to just see it over, over and over again. Perhaps that is also why I remember them so vividly? Absolutely stunning abstracts.

Well, to set the record straight, I started laser shows in Dallas in the Richland College Planetarium and my business all grew from there. Laser Fusion was one my trademark rock shows there.

The guy that did the inflatable dome laser shows at the Texas State Fair and other fairs was owned by Larry & Lois Wisdom. Their company name was Laser Fair, Inc and were out of Sterling, CO. Larry contacted me shortly after the fair started in '79, I believe, saying his Coherent Radiation (CR) 1W Krypton laser failed. I rented him my CR 2W Mixed-Gas laser for the rest of that Dallas gig. They had a really nice company name that spoke to exactly what they did, travel the fair circuits.

Larry had a really nice business card shown here. It was a prismatic card so that when you rocked it a bit the radial fans would appear to turn.



I still have two of his cards. On the back of each is stamped "VIP PASS GOOD FOR 2 PERSONS".

Those were the early days, eh? Sadly, I just learned Larry died in 2006. You can read a bit of his obituary here http://showpeople.typepad.com/carniv...wisdom_di.html

[kecked]

I was taken to a laserium show in Cleveland ohio where Dale Harder was the laserist. I fell in love with it and spent the rest of my life chasing down the experience. Later I got a scientific American book and built a nitrogen laser, then got a hene with a mirror on speakers, then SVS lasers, then reconnected with Dale 35 years later through Rob Mudryk who introduced me to Matt Polak, who introduced me to William Benner and then Casey Stack, Chuck Rau..... a whole list of help. Matt gave me a pcaom to use with an argon I got from one stop laser and lent me a 35 mw hene. Then I graduated to diode red, then blue and now green for total solid state.

[Eidetic]

Great reading Dale Harder's name here. I have to believe he has a few very old lasers laying about the place, and really want to visit him sometime!

And another welcome to Lasermaster1977. I love reading about '70s vintage laserists' experiences. I wonder if there's a list of them, a "who was who". I'd imagine the list of those from the '60s is pretty short.

[lasermaster1977]

Great reading Dale Harder's name here. I have to believe he has a few very old lasers laying about the place, and really want to visit him sometime!

And another welcome to Lasermaster1977. I love reading about '70s vintage laserists' experiences. I wonder if there's a list of them, a "who was who". I'd imagine the list of those from the '60s is pretty short.

Thanks for the welcome Eidetic. The list in the DFW area in '76-77 would consist of four names. Ivan Dryer's Laserium of course was my influence, that plus getting to create and play with a .5mW HeNe and two DC motors with spinning mirrors in '76.

I recall in 79 or 80, there was a university professor who hooked up brain waves from sleeping volunteers to four GS XY galvos (RYGB), each color representing different brain activity. They toured science museums with this "kiosk" type presentation using local sleep volunteers. The sleepers where in the large kiosk isolation room and the laser projections went from the top of the kiosk to the sides of the darkened room. It was called something like Brainscape. What made it cool and visually entertaining was the slow, strobing refresh of each oscilloscope-style scan and the brilliant four colors scans, one on each of the four walls in quadrature. I also rented him my mixed gas laser when his failed while he was at the Dallas Museum of Science. We two later collaborated on an indoor/outdoor laser presentation for Nike on the slopes of Big Sky Ski Resort in Montana, I believe in '81, using my 2W mixed gas and 5W Spectra 164 Argon.

[SpitzSTP]

Thanks for filling in these priceless details! As I recall, the last time I saw the Laser Fair show at the Texas State Fair was in the 1979 season and it occurs to me what I was seeing on the dome back then, could easily have been coming from your CR 2W. Then advance the calendar to 2014 and here I am, talking to you about it. I think that is pretty amazing. At one point I thought the Laserium show I saw at the Kirkpatrick Planetarium in Oklahoma City in the summer of 1980 was the driving influence behind my lifelong quest to recapture the experience.. But now that I think of it, it was the Laser Fair shows that started it all for me. Where did Laser Fusion perform the shows, did you take it on the road? Do you still have some of the original equipment from those days? I am saddened to hear that Larry had passed away in 2006 although I did not even know his name until yesterday. As your footnote says, "Everything depends on everything else" and that is so true, given the positive influence you and others gave to me as early pioneers of the industry. Thank you all, for doing it!

[SaltyRobot]

I started in laser shows in 1977 in Dallas. I knew Russell Rauch of Laser Presentations and believe I rented him my Coherent Radiation Mixed-Gas Laser when one of his lasers failed in the late 70's.
I got hooked in '76, enjoyed a career in it for 13 years. Still have a lot of my old stuff and am now reviving an old open and closed-loop galvo setup in my basement.

Russ was my dad's boss (my uncle worked there too early on as a EE but never ran any shows). They were located in Columbus OH. They spent the winter fixing equipment making new equipment and making shows for the next fair season. Yeah I don't doubt they had to borrow a laser. One bad bump on the roadway and something in the laser would inevitable break.