Cheap laser for concerts

[soforene]

.... i have a realy old video where we just dumped one behind the stage without even connecting dmx. ...

Dude !!!
That's quite sad.

Having a laser randomly throwing out patterns (especially continously, even during breaks between songs) smacks too much of an amateurish way to display a light show.
I realise that this was a cheapo affair but even getting some guy to flick the switch to "Off" between songs would be an improvement (oh, and a bit of haze, smoke).

I guess we all live and learn though and that's why forums like this exist. To offer guidance and advice.

[Amuse]

Thanks for great replies! I'm from Norway. To be safe I'll check with the police before I buy any lasers.

Considering what you've said about price, I think I will invest my money in cheaper ways to get a great live show. My budget before our live shows is about 400€. The thought we have is to have a grrrrreat live show for a Muse-cover band project, and establish a good reputation at clubs and good relationship with club owners. That way we can continue having a great live show to our own music.

I think we'll buy/make spotlights with foot-switches for on/off/blinking and make the stage and our outfits very thematic. But it seems that we'll have to wait with the lasers... But one day!! Not too soon!!

I really liked when smoke filled the stage in the facebook-video, but (no offence) it looked odd and unprofessional to have them turned on constantly. If a band member had hired a light guy or had connected the power to a foot-switch, the result would've been much better. I want my band's light show to enhance our music, not just be a fancy effect.

[soforene]

.... I'm from Norway.

Why not check if any members live near you and would be willing to help out at one or two concerts.
That way you'll get for more lasers than you can afford yourself at the moment plus a knowledgable pair of hands at the controls.

... To be safe I'll check with the police before I buy any lasers.....

Good luck with that.
I should imagine an ordinary copper would know less about lasers than you know already.

[mccarrot]

Why not check if any members live near you and would be willing to help out at one or two concerts.
That way you'll get for more lasers than you can afford yourself at the moment plus a knowledgable pair of hands at the controls.

Cruch lives in Norway.

[norty303]

If you're looking for some impact then why not consider strobes with a blinder function or some good old fashioned Molefay blinders? If you look at big stadium/festival gigs that have the wow factor, a lot of the time it's when they hit the crowd blinders. As with any effect, use sparingly, but these should be easy enough to trigger with a footswitch. Have a look at Thomann website, you can pick up 4 cell blinders for about £100 with lamps. You can run these from the Showtec/Botex 4 channel DMX dimmers (about £80) using 1 channel to run a pair of lamps (2 channels unused). If you want to use 2 blinders you'll need 1 dimmer for each. These will give you LOTS of impact within your budget.

I think they may even do blinders with built in dimmers, or smaller 2 lamp blinders.

If you absolutely must have lasers on a gig, hire in someone to do a proper job of it - you'll be much more authentic then with proper beams You could even replicate the Muse show properly then.

[colouredmirrorball]

LOL, you make me a QUALITY and SAFE laser usable for a band for 500 euro, this will save me a lot of time.

Where did someone mention quality?
I think 500 mW is a bit too much, say 100 mW - € 200 max
Housing: old computer case - free
DAC: soundcard - € 50?
scan set: cheap 20 kpps - € 100
€ 350 so far... not bad eh?
About scanfail and safety and the like... a lot of people don't have the money for it. Simply avoid audience scanning is a cheaper option.
I don't know what you call usable but I think some DMX laser effects above the audience are far more better than no lasers.

But if you really want a nice show for that one special night... hire it.

[mccarrot]

Its a band, they will use it as it was some kind of Par and they need to take it every week to a location. A laser in a computer case will not even last 3 shows. then its gone 350 euro.

You need a strong case and a flightcase.

Also a souncard dac is not usable with audiance.

a FB3 with the Muse show stored in the memory they can start with a very simple DMX panel would be nice.

[DMills]

Also a souncard dac is not usable with audiance.

Umm, how so?

Now it is not something I would be likely to do (Except as a get out of trouble fix), but not usable is a bit strong....

The DAC should NOT IMHO be involved in any way in audience safety (possibly beyond completing the projector interlock loop (Which should not itself be AUDIENCE safety critical), so it is not a safety critical component in the sense that a scan fail board is.

My firmly held view is that audience safety is ideally a function of black wrap, multiple stop down filters and mechanical beam blocks, not software that was not written and tested to SIL4 (And nobody writes laser show software to SIL4, because SIL4 is a nightmare).

Regards, Dan.

[mccarrot]

Can you assure for 100% the souncarddac wil NEVER put out a (unwanted) static beam in any case?

If your answer is no you cannot use it with audience in my opinion.

[DMills]

Can you assure for 100% the souncarddac wil NEVER put out a (unwanted) static beam in any case?

That is exactly my point, you cannot really say that about ANY DAC, the safety systems have to work irrespective of what comes down the ILDA cable.

If the projector is set up with hard masking so that a beam cannot ever go into the audience at unsafe power levels (even if it is static) then irrespective of whatever is being used as a DAC it is safe, same thing if there is scan fail hardware setup correctly, otherwise you have to assume that you could end up with a static beam in the crowd.

For very similar reasons I have issues with software controlled intensity maps as a means of keeping crowd scanning below MPE limits, what happens if the feedback resistor in the DAC output stage goes open?

What happens of someone puts a stilletto heel through the ILDA cable and manages to short X+,- and Y+,- to ground?

The DAC is far too far up the chain to make it a practical part of the safety systems.

Regards, Dan.