# Dragon Street Lamp (3d Printer)



## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Decided to do a big job on my 3D printer to create some fun lighting. It will be three dragon heads holding glowing balls in their mouths plus some form of torch overhead. I'll post things as it comes together. If it works out, I my post the design to thingiverse.
Here is what I have so far. I will give the heads a metallic finish rather than black. I will also hook it up to a fog machine so that steam will come out of their mouths.








http://www.garageofterror.com/dragonlamp.jpg

To make the heads look metallic, rather than paint, I use Smooth-On XTC-3D brush coating, but I add powdered metal in a 2/2/1 XTC/bronze power/brass powder ratio. If you have never worked with metal powders before, they are great at making plastic look like metal. Just paint it on, let harden then scrub with steal wool to bring out the metal sheen.


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## bobzilla (Nov 13, 2008)

Very cool!


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

Neat! Can't wait to see how the rest turns out! I did a large (as in time consuming!) 3D lantern print last year. Considering re-working my candelabra as a 3D print this year. Guess I better get going soon as we're in the sub 4-month time frame!


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## IMU (Apr 8, 2009)

Looking good.


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## fontgeek (Jul 24, 2006)

I might do glowing eyes (red or green) as well the torch. 
Maybe do the torch with flickering red and yellow LEDs, with a computer's fan blowing upwards, making ragged bits of mylar film wave to give the look and feel (without the heat) of fire. That flickering ambient light source will give the feeling of animation to the dragon skulls/heads.
just thoughts from the cheap seats


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

I have debated about the glowing eyes. Probably won't do that. If I do, it will probably be glowing "ruby crystals". For the torch, my first though is to put a dragon head on top in the bowl illuminated by flicker lights. I have always wanted to do fake flame. I have fans. Any recommendations for the mylar? It would have to be super thin I imagine.


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

Oooh, dragon heads! Nice!


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## K.Destra (Jul 8, 2020)

That's amazing. I've never seen anyone used a 3D printer like that before


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## fontgeek (Jul 24, 2006)

GOT said:


> I have debated about the glowing eyes. Probably won't do that. If I do, it will probably be glowing "ruby crystals". For the torch, my first though is to put a dragon head on top in the bowl illuminated by flicker lights. I have always wanted to do fake flame. I have fans. Any recommendations for the mylar? It would have to be super thin I imagine.


I'd check out a local window tinting shop, as the cheapest route, but you can also find or buy a mylar balloon and cut your "flames from that. Fastening the "flames to a coarse (large opening) piece of screen that is suspended above the fan(s) and light source(s) will do it.
As to the glowing eyes, the ruby jewels would work just fine, and having flickering lights behind them gives them some "movement" too. I wouldn't have them super bright. A more subtle approach will give you a much better effect.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Update: Here is a sketch of what I am going for. Sorry for using links but it has been a challenge to import photos to this forum.
http://www.garageofterror.com/dragonlamp3.jpg

I have finished the dragon heads, which is great because, technically, I can pretty much stop the prop here and call it a victory. 
http://www.garageofterror.com/dragonlamp2.jpg

Unfortunately, I want to put a flaming bowl and top of this. I looked at the flapping mylar approach, and it just doesn't look good to me with the smaller-scale props. It always looks like flapping mylar with a light shining on it. So, I am going to try a much more difficult approach. I'll keep you in the loop. Failure is an option here.






My biggest worry is how top-heavy this will be with the bowl filled with water...


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

That will be neat when it all comes together. Believe you all ready have a hollow center pole, no? Possibly could have the water / fogger at the bottom and just pipe fog up to the bowl?


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

I do have a pipe that will attach to a fog machine to put steam out the dragons' mouths. Thought of extending it up to the bowl, but a fog machine is not continuous. I doubt that water vapor from a mister will make it up the seven feet needed here. Thanks for the thought, though.


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

Oh, yeah - that is a bit higher than it seems from the photos, though at 7 feet, that would be a short climb up a ladder to fill?

Watching your video, others came up on the same theme. This one shows they pipe the fog a few feet, though the overall distance might depend on how much fog you can make initially and how humid/dry the original air is at the time.






Some Halloweens here have been humid/wet and I get an intense fog show out of my ultrasonic cauldron... others have been dry and the water fog barely makes it out the top!

The other thing to keep in mind is that those ultrasonic foggers have an 'ideal' water depth. Too deep or too shallow and they don't emit as much fog. The two best methods are to make a float so the emitter is always the same distance below the water, or possibly something better for your case - a big water reservoir in the bottom and a small pump moving water to a reservoir containing the mister(s) at the top. The top reservoir can be pretty small and would continuously overflow/return to the bottom to keep a constant depth. Though this does add complexity in the form of a pump and a couple additional tubes to supply/return water, but would keep all the water weight at the bottom.


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

Well, a moment of inspiration from you and a rainy/severe weather Saturday collided - and I thought "wouldn't it be cool to have a 3D printed water/fire/mister" so I started throwing some things together.

Not sure if this is of any use to you - either in actual files, or reverse inspiration, (heck, I don't even know if it will work at all!!) but here is what I have. You have to think of this as sort of an inverted top hat sitting in a trash can. About 1/4 inch of space between the two so the air can come up the wall, enter the fog container and jet some mist out through the slit. Need to go back tomorrow and add some standoffs, attachment points, etc.:

Outside 'shroud' with an attachment for a small 40mm fan









Inner mist container - will hold the water and a floating ultrasonic mister, allow air in from the fan and direct it down into the pool of mist.









Top 'lid' - this seals the outer shroud to the inner container and has a slit for the fog to exit 









LED 'ring' This holds several orange/yellow flicker LEDs just below the slit to light the fog sneaking through and produce the flames. 24 holes provided, but was thinking of filling them random / intermittently.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

This is great. Here is the setup I am working on. I'm showing just the inner bowl. The outer bowl will run up along those horns and hide the mechanism. I don't think I can get the fire effect all the way around with my mister so I am setting the dragon statue back in the bowl and will do the fire effect only in the front half. The beauty of 3D printing is that I can make a few versions and see how far I can push it. There is a slit in the lid and the mist will travel up the curved walls. I will put straws in between those walls like shown in that video. For lighting, I found these flicker lamps on Amazon that are very bright (though a bit pricey). I printed a parabolic reflector (from thingiverse, of coarse) and designed a holder to hold the lamp in the sweet spot. The lamps come with a battery pack, but you can run them off a 12V DC adapter. I bought a 4-way barrel splitter so I can run three lamps and the fan off of one wall adapter. I like you suggestion for the water. I was thinking of something similar, only manual with a large syringe I have. I didn't think a pump would get the water up seven feet but, upon your prompting, I found a small pump for $18 on Amazon that should get the job done (so much extra money/work over a stupid fire effect - why do we do this to ourselves?).
http://www.garageofterror.com/bowlsetup.jpg


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

Cool. I think having the fan in the top like that saves a lot of hassle and doing the semi-circle flame will allow the air somewhere to get in. I thought about a single container and fan on the top, but was worried the fan would pull in its own mist and create more of a fire tornado! ...which could be a whole other modification of the theme!


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## Hairazor (Mar 13, 2012)

Hot Dang!! This is gonna be EPIC


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

The statue will be over the fan and I will have the airflow coming in form the back so there is no interference.


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

Ran an experimental prototype last night - wasn't terribly impressed. I will put some observations below for consideration.

I set up a big salad bowl with water and a 16mm mister. The mister is rated at 24V, but I've found overdriving them a bit can make more fog. Since I was experimenting - and have time to order more before Halloween - and this was a spare, I ran it up to 32V!

Used a couple thin pieces of foam insulation board to make a slit across the salad bowl - for the fog to be ejected. Cut a small square near the edge to blow a 50mm fan into the fog and eject it out the slit.

The mister has red/yellow/blue LEDs which do a color-change show, and I also tried a few orange and yellow flicker LEDs.


Observations:

Even with the fog slit and the fan about 8" away, I still had 're-circulation' issues where the fan was pulling in the 'fire fog'. Some additional intake shroud ducting helped.

Fog quantity - I never could hit a 'sweet spot' - even adjusting the speed of the fan. If you blow too much air, the fog is too thin and you don't really get any effect. If you don't blow enough air, the fog doesn't exit the slit with enough velocity to look like fire. Since the fog was cooler than surrounding air*, it just settled back around the slit like a low-lying 'swamp' fog. One overdriven fogger could not make enough fog fast enough for a ~12 inch slit. i have 4 others in storage I might drag out and try.

*note - Without going into a doctoral thesis on meteorology, suffice it to say, with the relatively warm/dry air of summer fully in place, the mister can cool the air dozens of degrees by adding the fog. So it really wants to be a low-lying swamp fog vs a rising 'fire' fog. Though the cooler air around Halloween should help the fog rise. Possibly a bowl of warm water, too?

It also seemed like just blowing the air in, there was a lot of swirling in the fog, but not necessarily a lot of 'ejecting' of the fog. Thinking back to the mist vaporizers, it seems like they use a constant water level system and have a 'chimney' type tube where air is blown in at the base and fog ejects from the top. This might be a better way to keep a constant water level on the fogger and eject the fog in a more thorough manner.

Lighting - the general LED lights of the mister really didn't make much of a 'fire' illuminating effect at all. Just looked like a bunch of orange/yellow/blue fog. The directed light of the LEDs seemed to help. Think of the way a 'liquid sky' effect lights up various bands in the fog, but a flashlight just makes a bright haze. It seems this effect really needs a thin sheet of light to look the best.


Anyway... useful, or useless, there are my thoughts / observations.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Don't give up! I did a quick test last night just throwing together some stuff and it shows promise.




This setup was simpler than yours. I think fan voltage plus and adjustable aperture opening for the fan are important. I think that a very bright light source is important.
By the way, that great orange/yellow effect in the video isn't so visible in person. The camera exposure was trying to help me out. The mist is still a bit heavy, but again, this was a 5min experiment.


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## Batbuddy (Sep 3, 2014)

Back 15 years ago the Fake flame machines were always white natural silk fabric. I made a few back then and found some actual silk which works waaay better than any other material (fabric). In my experimentation, I found that you need to have just the right amount of air flow, and prefect lighting position. The silk is easier to control than other fibers and is more directional that mist/fog, but you guys are doing really great with the whole fog concept, I am sure you will figure it out. I am with corey872 that the lighting needs to be a thin blade of light. With either fabric or fog you basically need to have the material passing in and out of the light which creates the illusion of fire.


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## rgerhards (Mar 2, 2019)

You are amazing. Your website is awesome. I've bookmarked it because there is some great stuff I want to try.


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## rgerhards (Mar 2, 2019)

rgerhards said:


> You are amazing. Your website is awesome. I've bookmarked it because there is some great stuff I want to try.


www.garageofterror.com


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Ok, I had a bit of a setback because my computer went down hard and is in the shop. I can't post a video yet, but I did make the inner bowl, mist vent and fan holder and did a real test. Fake fire is hard, but this looked pretty damn good for an amateur first try. I will post the video when I get my computer back.
It is still going to be top heavy and my yard is about 3 inches of top soil over 6 feet of solid rock. I'd rather not pour a cement base as I would like to be able to break this down and keep it in my attic. Any thought on how to stabilize a 2.5" diameter, 7' tall pipe with about 8 pounds at the top? Unfortunately, the center of the pipe is filled with electronic wires, water lines and a fog hose. I hate the thought of stay wires but I might have to go that route.
This would have been so much easier if the fake flames didn't work...


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## Pumpkin5 (Aug 8, 2010)

Love the Dragon heads and I cannot wait to see it all come together. So far it's very cool. :jol:


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## fontgeek (Jul 24, 2006)

GOT said:


> Ok, I had a bit of a setback because my computer went down hard and is in the shop. I can't post a video yet, but I did make the inner bowl, mist vent and fan holder and did a real test. Fake fire is hard, but this looked pretty damn good for an amateur first try. I will post the video when I get my computer back.
> It is still going to be top heavy and my yard is about 3 inches of top soil over 6 feet of solid rock. I'd rather not pour a cement base as I would like to be able to break this down and keep it in my attic. Any thought on how to stabilize a 2.5" diameter, 7' tall pipe with about 8 pounds at the top? Unfortunately, the center of the pipe is filled with electronic wires, water lines and a fog hose. I hate the thought of stay wires but I might have to go that route.
> This would have been so much easier if the fake flames didn't work...


I think I'd look at a heavy umbrella base, maybe putting a small garden patch around the base to cover the base itself and to help keep the dragon heads out of reach by TOTs. Some of the cast iron one have holes in them to stake them down. Also keep in mind that if you have to run electricity to it (the dragon head fixture), it's good to think about how you are going to get power to it well beforehand.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Well, my computer is still down, but I am figuring ways to get things done without it. Here is a short video of the completed mist faux fire mechanism. The bowl of water is covered with a plexiglass lid that has a curved slit cut in it. There is an adjustable computer fan that blows the mist through the slit and up through a raised wall structure about 2" high with several cut drinking straws glued in (like in that German video I shared earlier). I think it is looking very good. Lighting with just the flicker lamps I purchased didn't do the trick for me alone, so I created a couple of LED spotlights to help the effect. You can't quite tell in the video, since the colors in the recording saturate, but the left side has a simple LED spotlight with 7 ulta-bright red LEDs arranged in a circle pattern. That added a color depth needed that I didn't get with the amber flicker lamps alone. I though it would be cool to add some blue flames in the mix so I created a second LED spotlight. This one had a bottom line of three blue LEDs with a line of four amber LEDs above that and a third line of 5 red LEDs directly above that. Though not perfect, it does give the suggestion of blue flame at a small section of the base transitioning to red flame as it travels up. Unfortunately, it all looks white in the video (you can see some light blue shining off the dragon centerpiece).






The dragon statue at the center was something I pulled off thingiverse. Had to cut it in three pieces to print something big enough to use as a centerpiece. I really don't want to think about how much I am spending on filament right now.

Here is a second video that shows the mechanism. You can see a plexiglass shield protecting the lights from the water mist. As I feared, this fogged up too much so I removed it and just hope everything is waterproof enough. This effect doesn't do well with any kind of wind. Hopefully, it won't be windy on Halloween or I will have to find a protected place for this.


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

Really impressive work, GOT!


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Just a quick note for anyone trying something like this. The lighting must be super bright and has to illuminate the mist from behind. I tried hitting it from both sides with LED beams but only the light from behind was visible.


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

Guess your progress on this project sort of went under my radar while I was knee deep in working on the FOGduino. But looks like it is coming along nicely! Can't wait to see the whole project!


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Well Corey, I took your advice and set up the feed and bleed water bath for the mister. The pump seems to be working fine and I made a quick design change to hide the water lines. Here is an unnecessary video of the system, but it does show the lamp for the first time on the stand.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

It's done! The dragon street lamp is finished and looks great. The project isn't perfect, though. The pump makes gurgling noises that are annoying and the top gets pretty wet from all the mist. The flicker lamps are not rated for outdoor use so the moisture they are seeing does worry me. Also, the video is in my garage with the door open. Even then, the wind affects the mist effect. The effect looks better indoors without air currents for sure. On the plus side, the fogger works great. I came very, very close to pulling the fogger as I was have real issues getting the fog pipe, two water lines, three electrical cords (one to a four-way splitter) and flicker electronics all in that 2.5" PVC pipe. I persevered, though, and it paid off.






Here is another video in the daytime. You can see the metal finish better in this one.






I do love my 3D printer! This is by far the largest project I have ever done with it.


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## Batbuddy (Sep 3, 2014)

Gorgeous! What an awesome piece.


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

Stunning prop and piece of art!


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## Hauntiholik (May 17, 2006)

Looks fantastic!


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

Turned out great. So it is running water fog out the top and hot/theater fog out the dragons?


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Yes. The top bowl has an inner bowl (shown earlier in the thread) that holds water, an ultrasonic mister and a computer fan which blows the mist up through a slit in front of the dragon statue. The water bath has a feed and bleed system with a water pump and reservoir at the base of the lamp. The dragon heads (and bowl) are sitting on top of the 2.5" PVC pipe and are attached to a plug that fits into the PVC 2.5" PVC pipe, but also has a 1" PVC pipe (internal) feeding it the fog. There is a hole in the back of each dragon head mouth for the fog to exit. Sorry, still haven't replaced my computer yet to I can't post pictures (only videos as irony would have it). The fogger is on a timer to do short blasts every 30 sec.


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## jdblue1976 (Nov 18, 2010)

Very cool. Well done.


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## Daphne (Oct 18, 2006)

This turned out great! It is very creative and I've never seen anything like this! 

I was considering having my phantom hold a ball of fire with either a mister or silk flames around/in it while also standing in a fake fire and have learned a lot from this. Thanks for sharing it and congrats on such an amazing prop! Love those dragon heads too! Such a cool lamp!


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## whichypoo (Sep 5, 2009)

wish I could think about and have the know how to do these things . just wow


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## WickedWino (Sep 3, 2013)

That is one magnificent prop! Well done!


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## Daphne (Oct 18, 2006)

Just out of curiosity, what LEDs did you use? You said they needed to be super bright. I've purchased from Evan Designs before but they are single bulbs that are typically used for miniatures so I'm not sure if grouping a few of the 5mm bulbs would be bright enough. It sure would be nice to buy something small but already put together in one light... 

Also hoping a fan and the 3 disk unit from House of Hydro can get the mist from a bucket on the ground to chest high... Your system is brilliant if not.

Thanks.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

The LEDs I used were called "ultra bright". I don't have a rating on them. Maybe 10,000-20,000 MCD? They are uncomfortable to look directly into one. They basically have to be as bright as you can find.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

I don't think the mist will travel that high before it dissipates. Fog would, but fog looks like fog with a light shining on it.


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## Daphne (Oct 18, 2006)

Too funny, you and I are also on a similar thread on Halloween Forum. I didn't think it was possible to get the mist to travel at all and my experiments this week with a cheap mister backed that up but this guy has a mobile setup and it appears to be hooked into a pack hanging off the back of his belt. 




I commented on the video and emailed the address the poster shared but the video has been posted for a long time and I didn't hear back. While looking through House Of Hydro videos there was a comment where they mentioned this same video so I contacted John at HoH. Here is a portion of his response below as to whether he had additional information on how it was done and he also addressed my desire to get mist from a bucket on the ground to a hand on a prop. I'm not opposed to a bucket behind the prop off the ground but it would still have to travel with the current design. The prop will be a Johnny's ghost if anyone is familiar with it except with a fireball instead of the lantern and while the arm moves slightly, it does move. John at HoH was super nice and helpful.

"In regards to the Ghost Rider costume, I think he probably had everything built into the pack on his waist. It would have been like carrying a cup of water on your head had it been up in the mask. The single-disk unit produces a good bit of fog for its size. Of course, the more tubing that you have, the more fog you will lose to condensation. Six or eight feet shouldn't be a real big deal though. If you are looking for concentrated intervals of fog, I would let the fogger build up fog inside your container by running it continuously, and then initiate the fan or Compressed Air to essentially punch all of the fog out in one shot.

If you are using a 5-gallon bucket, I would experiment a little bit with different water levels if you do it that way. It will change the density of the fog dispersed. If you are going to be pushing fog out pretty continuously, and need Rapid refilling of the chamber, I would probably consider using at 3 disc unit.

I hope that helped some. I would really really love some pictures or video of this when you're done!if you have any questions at all, I'm happy to help!"


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

He is walking with suspiciously good posture. I am interested is the lighting he used. Looks pretty uniform for LEDs but you would probably want LEDs for the power requirements.
This video was posted earlier in this thread but I will re-post it because I think this is the best approach for what you are trying to do.






You might even try to hide some tubes inside the specter so that some of the mist originates from the body itself.


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## Daphne (Oct 18, 2006)

Funny, I noticed his posture also and couldn’t figure out if he was trying to keep lights and stuff from falling off his head or he was just being macho for the role. 

John did say it was LEDs. I’ve done some research but no clue on which LEDs to get, halogens in that application would not be worth the risk of burning the daylights out of your head if there was a problem! I don’t want actual fire ha ha!

I’m really torn on this. To pipe it remotely is going to require, at a minimum, the 3 head unit which is about $90 and no guarantee it will work.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

I think the effect you are going for is going to be very difficult, especially outside. If you want a ground effect, I say have a burned area around it with glowing coals (like it just torched the area it is standing on) and focus on the fireball it's holding.


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## Daphne (Oct 18, 2006)

I completely agree GOT. After going back and forth repeatedly I decided a couple nights ago that while it would be a stellar effect IF it worked, it has the potential to cost quite a bit, be a challenge to incorporate on a moving prop, risk my electronics and integrity of the arm/fabric with that much moisture in the vicinity that would create weight issues and yet still have the prospect of complete and utter failure even if the wind cooperates. I decided to use a lantern for the animatronic and make a handheld fireball for a static prop but it is going to be with lights/great stuff and flames made with clear PEG and LEDs, no fans, mister or water. 

I am still considering doing the faux fire effect with the mister but am thinking about putting it inside a large jack o lantern. The effect would be mostly protected inside the pumpkin and you could see it through the eyes/nose/mouth. It could also be built with the much cheaper 1 head mister and an 8.1 quart plastic bowl with lid so I think it would be good for the duration of Halloween night without needing a larger water source to feed it. A large, flared 16" tall plastic flower pot would be placed, upside down, over the bowl with the jack o lantern built on the outside of it so moisture would be in direct contact with the inside of the plastic pot. My only concern is if the mist blowing up inside the pumpkin would be a problem since it can only escape through the eyes/nose/mouth. The fan would be on the back of the head with a "tunnel" going from the fan to the bowl top to blow into the bowl so moisture that would accumulate on the top wouldn't be raining down on the fan. Sorry, way TMI ha ha. 

I do appreciate your suggestions and help, you definitely have the effect down!


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