I am the Director of an indoor drum line group of high school kids. We are doing a show about the Current War. I have a "Tesla Coil" that lights up using DMX controller. I want to make it look like it is shooting electrical current from the top of the coil like the picture below (less full of course). I'm needing suggestions on:

A) What type of lights to use (preferably round strands, very bright, etc.)
B) how to connect multiple strands to run remotely

Any help or ideas or retailers would be greatly appreciated.

 

You could try some thin frosted acrylic rods lit from the ends with bright LEDs.

The rods can be bent into different shapes using a little heat.

 

Thank you! Any suggestions on a particular light source?

 

Making this very realistic is going to be expensive and difficult. A general approach that comes to mind is to use a fan, some tinsel strands, and a combination of purple and white LEDs.

Rigging something that would come off more realistic than that would require a lot of work on light pipes (the aforementioned acrylic rods) as well as using some sort of black out curtain to hide them when not lit. Supporting them would also be very challenging.

The idea I have in mind is flat tinsel strips blown from below by a fan so the move up and away from the Tesla coil prop. Using a combination of high powered purple and white LEDs, also from below seems like it would produce an effect reminiscent of the arcs, at least.

Alternatively, a scrim behind with a rear projection of actually arcs from a coil aligned with the prop might work.

One more possibility, look around for a real Tesla coil of reasonable scale, you might be able to rent one, and an operator, and stage around it with the real thing happening, which could be cool.

 

Hello,

Perhaps @djsfantasi has some ideas. He has made many props as I understand.

Bertus

 

Making this very realistic is going to be expensive and difficult. A general approach that comes to mind is to use a fan, some tinsel strands, and a combination of purple and white LEDs.

Rigging something that would come off more realistic than that would require a lot of work on light pipes (the aforementioned acrylic rods) as well as using some sort of black out curtain to hide them when not lit. Supporting them would also be very challenging.

The idea I have in mind is flat tinsel strips blown from below by a fan so the move up and away from the Tesla coil prop. Using a combination of high powered purple and white LEDs, also from below seems like it would produce an effect reminiscent of the arcs, at least.

Alternatively, a scrim behind with a rear projection of actually arcs from a coil aligned with the prop might work.

One more possibility, look around for a real Tesla coil of reasonable scale, you might be able to rent one, and an operator, and stage around it with the real thing happening, which could be cool.

Thank you!

 

Hello,

Perhaps @djsfantasi has some ideas. He has made many props as I understand.

Bertus

I like Yaakov’s approach. There are some things I would add…

Somehow, if the lights could be remotely controlled with a microprocessor, I’d pulse the lights.

Secondly, you could light with multiple instruments fitted with gobos. Thus, one could project multiple arcing shapes into the tinsel. If this is effected enough, the tinsel and fans may not be required.

If the effect is limited, one could rent a tinsel curtain, which is closed only when the effect is called for.

 

Rigging something that would come off more realistic than that would require a lot of work on light pipes (the aforementioned acrylic rods)

I may be wrong, but don't light pipes work similar to fiber optics? Where the light stays in the center of the fiber and is only seen at the end/termination. The light doesn't actually light up the sides of the fibers or at least not much.

I tried years ago to make some turnsignals for a car I was building and wanted them to be made from plastic rod with the light bulb hidden, the light shining along a rod. I could not get the rod to light up enough to work, but the end was bright.

 

I may be wrong, but don't light pipes work similar to fiber optics? Where the light stays in the center of the fiber and is only seen at the end/termination. The light doesn't actually light up the sides of the fibers or at least not much.

No, you aren’t wrong but by roughing up the outside of the pipe will cause diffusion of the light that is otherwise reflecting off the inner walls of the pipe, and the whole thing will illuminate.

[EDIT: removed a spurious “on you” the presence of which I cannot account for.]

 

No, you aren’t wrong but by roughing up the outside of the pipe on you will cause diffusion of the light that is otherwise reflecting off the inner walls of the pipe, and the whole thing will illuminate.

see my edit of my post.

 

No, you aren’t wrong but by roughing up the outside of the pipe will cause diffusion of the light

I tried glass beading the rods and I didn't help much, but did take away from the look I was after.

 

I tried glass beading the rods and I didn't help much, but did take away from the look I was after.

Normally a light guide has what is called total internal reflection. That is, all of the light passes from the end reflects from the inner walls and so does not emit from the sides. The interface between the pipes outer surface and the air acts as a mirror. But, if the surface causes scattering instead of total reelection, light is emitted.

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This effect is used in lighting in various ways. You've probably seen acrylic light pipes used for LED indicators that Have a closing end, not just the end surface, but a small section of the end of the pipe lights up. This can be extended to the whole thing iif desired. Different ways of making the surface scatter light will be more or less effective.

Bead blasting the rods might not work as well as using abrasives that scratch because the beads are round and peen rather than form sharp edges. This is just specualtion on my part, I've never tried it. I have made effective lighting from sanded acrylic though.

 

Just for the record, my suggestion had nothing to do with "light pipes" just standard frosted acrylic rods.

And I have been lighting these things for decades, a dab of white paint on the unlit end and then some black helps the make them brighter.

 

Just for the record, my suggestion had nothing to do with "light pipes" just standard frosted acrylic rods.

And I have been lighting these things for decades, a dab of white paint on the unlit end and then some black helps the make them brighter.

That is a light pipe, though. Acrylic is the standard material for purpose made light pipes and if you take a piece of acrylic (or glass, or polycarbonate) and use it to channel light, it’s a light pipe.