During the 2005 Christmas season, I spent a lot of time viewing websites and YouTube that contained videos of the product of persons fascinated with computerized light displays. You know, the ones where the lights blink on and off synchronized to a song. The biggest one that made the circuits that year was the house of Carson Williams and his interpretation of Wizards of Winter performed by Tran-Siberian Orchestra (TSO). You’ve also probably seen the many programs on HGTV such as “Over The Top Holiday” or “What’s Up With That Christmas House” that show the extremes people go to to celebrate the season.
Well I thought it would be fun to explore the possibility of doing an animated computerized light display, so I started reading about what it entailed. I searched the web and found many sources, a main one being Planet Christmas. I also had to convince my wife that I wouldn’t create a trashy display, but one with style and classic looks. So in May I moved forward buying a 16-channel show director and MP3 player from Light-O-Rama. Before the unit arrived, I decided where to place the lights on and around the house. I also decided to build 16 mini-trees using tomato cages, which Mary recommended. Each mini-tree contains 100 clear, 100 red, and 100 green mini-lights. When the show director arrived the first week in October and I started the sequencing. This entails the selection of music, and then synchronizing the music with the lights. You decide which lights turn on when and for how long. Whether you want them to fade up and/or down, to make them shimmer or twinkle, and how bright they should be. It takes approximately 3 hours to program the lights for one minute of music.
Then you have to have a way for people to listen to the music while watching the light display. To make that happen I set up a low-powered FM radio station, broadcasting on an unused frequency of 91.1 FM. The last step was to create a sign placed in the front yard that told people watching the light display to
Listen To The Lights
91.1FM
I had hoped to get the display up and running by Thanksgiving night, but being on crutches (another story) I enlisted the assistance of my wife, daughter, son-in-law, and their exchange student from Germany to string the lights and extension cords. You need a ton of extension cords for such a project. They got the lights up and our first show was Saturday, December 2. And it worked.
The show continued on for several nights, with more and more cars stopping to see why the lights were jumping all around, but then it rained. Water and electricity don’t go together, and the rain got into the light connections causing the GFIs to pop. So the next day, Mary and I were out checking out each connection and drying off what was wet. Then we got smart and wrapped Saran Wrap at all connections, which worked very well when the next rain came.
The last show was New Year’s Eve, and it wasn’t unusual to look out the window and see two or three cars parked, taking in the sights. One mother told me her son thought “it was magic.” Several told friends and family to stop by to see the show. One man said he stopped to see the lights, went and got his wife and children, coming back to Listen to the Lights, and then made a trip their his parents, brining them back for some great Christmas fun.
Below are links to the five songs that were synchronized to the lights. In all we had 9,600 lights displayed. After watching the videos, let me know what you think of our display by entering a comment at the link below.
To watch Carol of the Bells, click here
To watch Good King Wenceslas, click here
To watch Jingle Bells, click here
To watch Overature From Miracle On 34th Street, click here
To watch We Wish You a Merry Christmas, click here