A plea for safety, pl edition.

[White-Light]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/01/he...aser.html?_r=1


Injuries from Class 4 consumer lasers: There have been no reported injuries from commercially manufactured Class 4 consumer lasers (over 500 milliwatts of visible light), as of April 7 2012. This includes the Wicked Lasers Spyder III Arctic “1 watt” laser which first came out in August 2010, as well as similar high-power Class 4 lasers sold by other companies such as DinoDirect.com. There have been two reports of injuries from homemade or hobbyist kit Class 4 lasers, the results are minor injury and more severe.

Injuries from deliberate exposures: Most proven or credible reports of laser eye injuries to the general public are self-inflicted -- often by youths who do not realize (or care about) the consequences. FDA has heard of injuries caused when a person intentionally stared into the beam for a prolonged period of time.

Yet the sky is falling?

Maybe in the US nothing has been reported but there are instances of permanent eye damage caused by momentary exposure to laser pointers over 200mw:

http://www.laserist.org/2009-07_Belgian-incident.htm

The people there certainly didn't deliberately stare down a beam for a prolonged period of time.

One thing to be remembered about pointers is that I understand they aren't usually modulated and that makes a huge difference.

With my projector, a 2.8W modulated beam won't even char paper after 10's of seconds of exposure (although the beam is warm to touch and definitely not eye safe).

The same beam in test mode which is unmodulated, burns a crater into chipboard in around a second. After a couple of second of exposure that crater is around 2-3mm deep and the house fire alarms are going off!

This was my chipboard after a few unmodulated beams - each exposure only a second - 3 seconds long:



Never underestimate the danger of an unmodulated source.

[absolom7691]

the eyes do a pretty good job of protecting themselves.

Please forgive my ignorance, but could you provide some information about how well the human eye protects itself from direct exposure to a unmodulated and narrow divergence class 4 laser...

[norty303]

Where's that thread about the guy who's pointer rolled off the table and shot him in the eye? Had some very graphic pictures. Also interested to know if his incident shows up on the statistics because he went for a lot of treatment. Would tell us if the lack of evidence of injuries is due to lack of injuries or poor reporting.

[Stuka]

Please forgive my ignorance, but could you provide some information about how well the human eye protects itself from direct exposure to a unmodulated and narrow divergence class 4 laser...

I have no doubt he will be along soon to expound on that one -
He just got his first projector, but is evidently a laser-pointer guru, and obviously knows MUCH more about laser safety than the likes of those pros who have been in the laser entertainment and scientific applications community for years!!

Same dude that evidently thinks Pangolin needs to overhaul QuickShow since it doesn't draw images just like Photoshop.

Not saying that I'm noticing a trend or anything...

[absolom7691]

I have no doubt he will be along soon to expound on that one -
He just got his first projector, but is evidently a laser-pointer guru, and obviously knows MUCH more about laser safety than the likes of those pros who have been in the laser entertainment and scientific applications community for years!!

Same dude that evidently thinks Pangolin needs to overhaul QuickShow since it doesn't draw images just like Photoshop.

Not saying that I'm noticing a trend or anything...

Exactly! Foolish, especially to dispute Steve who has been in this field long enough to remember when laser light was measured in angstroms!

And again, against Jon who makes and has made a living in this field. These guys obviously know their stuff. Not to mention all of the other pros who have commented here.

[tsteele93]

Exactly! Foolish, especially to dispute Steve who has been in this field long enough to remember when laser light was measured in angstroms!

And again, against Jon who makes and has made a living in this field. These guys obviously know their stuff. Not to mention all of the other pros who have commented here.

That's because none of that quite impressive experience has much to do at all with laser eye injuries. You can build lasers, make shows, put on shows, and so much more for decades and it wouldn't necessarily give you any real experience or knowledge of laser eye injuries.

So no disrespect to their knowledge of lasers or experience with them is even implied, but all of that knowledge and experience doesn't amount to much at all when it comes to experience with laser eye injuries.

In fact, if they are doing their jobs well then they should have virtually NO experience with laser eye injuries.

Tom

[tsteele93]

I have no doubt he will be along soon to expound on that one -
He just got his first projector, but is evidently a laser-pointer guru, and obviously knows MUCH more about laser safety than the likes of those pros who have been in the laser entertainment and scientific applications community for years!!

Same dude that evidently thinks Pangolin needs to overhaul QuickShow since it doesn't draw images just like Photoshop.

Not saying that I'm noticing a trend or anything...

Ad hominem at it's best!

Sorry I don't worship at the same altar you do when it comes to laser show software and I realize that you believe that because I am new to the software that there is NO WAY I could have discovered that a module was klunky or poorly designed, but that has nothing to do with this discussion Stuka.

Half of the time you were talking about different software than I was anyway, so I wasn't real sure how much you were comprehending in that discussion anyway.

Anyway, as I have said - just because I haven't played with laser projectors for the past 20 years and, aside from my recent interest interest in the hobby, the last time I have dabbled in lasers was during the optics portions of getting an engineering degree, I think that we are on fairly even playing fields when it comes to knowledge of laser eye injury.

For one thing, the influx of dangerous lasers into the general public's hands has been a relatively new thing - mostly taking place over the past 2-3 years. And we all have similar access to research in this area.

So you can try to dismiss the clearly available facts all you want, but the FACT is that in spite of a MASSIVE influx of high power pointers and laser projectors into the general public's hands, the sky has not fallen.

It just hasn't... Clearly it could. Clearly the danger exists, but for whatever reasons, laser eye injury is very much the exception rather than the rule. And I'm not suggesting that there aren't or that there won't be some notable incidents, I'm simply saying that in spite of Sacred Steve's prediction over two years ago that "at 700mW to 1W injuries will be all too common," it simply didn't happen the way he predicted it would happen.

[Stuka]

Ad hominem at it's best!

Sorry I don't worship at the same altar you do when it comes to laser show software and I realize that you believe that because I am new to the software that there is NO WAY I could have discovered that a module was klunky or poorly designed, but that has nothing to do with this discussion Stuka.

Half of the time you were talking about different software than I was anyway, so I wasn't real sure how much you were comprehending in that discussion anyway.

Anyway, as I have said - just because I haven't played with laser projectors for the past 20 years and, aside from my recent interest interest in the hobby, the last time I have dabbled in lasers was during the optics portions of getting an engineering degree, I think that we are on fairly even playing fields when it comes to knowledge of laser eye injury.

For one thing, the influx of dangerous lasers into the general public's hands has been a relatively new thing - mostly taking place over the past 2-3 years. And we all have similar access to research in this area.

So you can try to dismiss the clearly available facts all you want, but the FACT is that in spite of a MASSIVE influx of high power pointers and laser projectors into the general public's hands, the sky has not fallen.

It just hasn't... Clearly it could. Clearly the danger exists, but for whatever reasons, laser eye injury is very much the exception rather than the rule. And I'm not suggesting that there aren't or that there won't be some notable incidents, I'm simply saying that in spite of Sacred Steve's prediction over two years ago that "at 700mW to 1W injuries will be all too common," it simply didn't happen the way he predicted it would happen.

OK, you're right -

I admit I rarely use Latin expressions, and there's no way I would have learned anything about the hazards of lasers during my 20 years of working with laser and weapons systems while flying for Uncle Sam. And no doubt "Sacred Steve's" (and other's) many years of experience and concerns are unfounded and probably based on antiquated knowledge.

With that said, I'll just concede that like many on this forum, I am part of the know- nothing crowd.
Time for me to put on my heavy robes and aluminum- foil hat and pay my daily homage to my Pangolin altar I secretly erected in my garage...

[absolom7691]

That's because none of that quite impressive experience has much to do at all with laser eye injuries. You can build lasers, make shows, put on shows, and so much more for decades and it wouldn't necessarily give you any real experience or knowledge of laser eye injuries.

So no disrespect to their knowledge of lasers or experience with them is even implied, but all of that knowledge and experience doesn't amount to much at all when it comes to experience with laser eye injuries.

In fact, if they are doing their jobs well then they should have virtually NO experience with laser eye injuries.

Tom

I wasn't aware that you had his resume in-hand. The reason I hold Steve in such high regard is that he has touched more optical equipment than most have even seen in schoolbooks. He is also a professional and a professional adheres to to all the safety guidelines because in his line of work, you typically get only one chance.

The fact that the eye injuries are not reported doesn't mean that they aren't happening. To be honest, if I hit myself in the eye with a 1W laser pointer, I wouldn't report it either because I would look like a god damn moron. He and others also never said the world was going to come to an end or that the sky was falling. He was simply stating what will probably happen as ignorant greed runs rampant. As things progress, things become more dangerous. We are also not dealing with 700mW to 1W anymore. The new 9mm 445s are hitting 3W, a 200% increase. Within the next year or two, they may be hitting 4W or 5W. This is what he is talking about. What happens when visible diodes start pushing the 10W barrier for less than $200? PBS two of those and you've now got a 20W handheld. Granted, this may be a stretch, but you see the progression here. This grows into a very serious eye hazard, fire hazard and personal injury hazard etc. etc. These diodes could reach a power level where even a refraction could cause eye damage.

You have people making cigarette lighters out of these diodes, aiming them at planes (which IS reported and the numbers ARE growing), and you have Kryoman pointing unmodulated beams into the crowds. This is a growing problem. I just can't believe that you are so ignorant that you can't see this.

[tsteele93]

OK, you're right -

I admit I rarely use Latin expressions, and there's no way I would have learned anything about the hazards of lasers during my 20 years of working with laser and weapons systems while flying for Uncle Sam. And no doubt "Sacred Steve's" (and other's) many years of experience and concerns are unfounded and probably based on antiquated knowledge.

I'm sorry you are taking this so personally. I haven't ONCE said, or even SUGGESTED that anyone's experience is based on antiquated knowledge.

Did you read what I wrote?

I said that his/your knowledge is based on totally different experiences and data than the information we are discussing now.

Just because you have 20+ years of experience with LASERS doesn't mean you have any firsthand knowledge of laser-related eye injuries. In fact, if you have been doing it right, hopefully you have no firsthand knowledge of laser related eye injuries.

With that said, I'll just concede that like many on this forum, I am part of the know- nothing crowd.
Time for me to put on my heavy robes and aluminum- foil hat and pay my daily homage to my Pangolin altar I secretly erected in my garage...

It is no secret...