It's time for another South Eastern Laser Enthusiast's Meeting!
Location is the same as always: The Newton-Conover Auditorium in Newton, North Carolina. Load-in and setup will be on Thursday, August 16th from Noon until 5 PM, with the pre-SELEM dinner party starting at 6 PM.
SELEM will officially start on Friday, August 17th at 10 AM. As usual, we will run until Midnight on Friday and Saturday. On Sunday we will need to shut things down around 5 PM so we can be out of the building by 7 PM.
I'd like to try something new this time. Several people have requested that the main auditorium be dedicated to running shows pretty much continuously. That would mean we would only have a few projectors set up in there. (One graphics projector aimed towards the screen and two beam projectors on stage aimed towards the audience.) DZ and RGB-gas are working together to bring a fiber-fed, dual-head projector and a 6 watt whitelight gas laser to run graphics on, and I'm hoping that allthatwhichis will be able to provide a matched pair of 1 watt RGB projectors for beam work in the auditorium.
However, one of the big draws for this event is seeing lots of projectors set up all at once. If we only have a few projectors in the auditorium, we won't be able to do the "club-SELEM" bit where we have everyone's projector running simultaneously with live music. So I've negotiated permission for us to use the cafeteria as a secondary laser display area. The plan is to take the scaffolding that we used to use on the stage and set it up in the cafeteria instead. That will give us more than enough space to put everyone's projector up. We can also set up a separate sound system (possibly including some turntables), so we'll be able to run live music and live laser shows in there. Unfortunately, we won't be able to get in to the cafeteria to set things up until Friday afternoon at around 3 PM. Also, we will probably need to cover the windows...
This is going to cost us another 30% or so, but I think we can still make it work with our budget. I also think the extra space will be nice, as it started to feel a little crowded at times last year. So unless I hear a bunch of negative feedback, I'm going to go ahead with this plan. (Translation: if you don't like this idea, SPEAK UP NOW while I still have time to change things...)
The attendance fee this year will be $60 per person, and for that you get an official SELEM shirt along with your admission. You are welcome to bring adult family or friends as your guest(s), but remember that you will be responsible for supervising them. (They will have to sign a waiver too.) Please do not abuse the guest provision: if your buddy is a laser hobbyist, he's not really your guest. He should be registering himself. But if you've got a neighbor or family member who is merely curious about lasers (or just wants to check out the shows), feel free to bring them along as your guest(s).
I don't have the shirt logo design finalized yet, but it will probably will not be as elaborate as last year. The company I have to use this year has a different pricing structure, so I can't go crazy with the design or the shirts will be prohibitively expensive. The plan is to continue to offer extra shirts for the same $20 as in previous years. (More details about the shirts as we get closer...) Please note that the shirt order will need to be finalized at least 3 weeks in advance, so if you sign up late you won't get a shirt. (Translation: sign up early!) NOTE: Shirt order is now closed (7-31-2012)
If you have specific shows you want to display in the auditorium, you'll need to reply in this thread with the specifics (graphics or beam show, basic content, and run length). Once I have a master list, I'll post a schedule for the main auditorium. (At a minimum, I'll be running Pink Floyd's Best of Echos graphics show from Mike Dunn, which runs about 1 hour.)
Likewise, if you've got gear that you want to bring, please reply in this thread with what you are bringing so we can make sure we have enough scaffold set up for everyone (and enough tables for all the computers in the cafeteria). And if anyone would like to volunteer their time for special presentations, that would be great. (I've already had several requests for a repeat of Displaser's "Home-made Lumia" presentation...)
As before, I'm planning on Mario to bring the bulk of the audio gear. If we need help with the second sound system for the cafeteria, we'll ask about it here, but I'm pretty sure we'll have it covered. Lazerjock will be handling the lanyards/name tags and the waivers. And Flecom and allthatwhichis will be setting up the network as before.
With regard to the auditorium projectors, if you have shows that run on Pangolin gear, all you need is the show content on a thumbdrive. We'll have a few computers set up at the back of the house to run the projectors. But if you have shows that run on other hardware (Mamba/easylase, or Spaghetti/sound card DAC), then you'll need to allow time to set up your computer in the auditorium so you can connect to the ILDA cables feeding the projectors. (We'd like to keep the auditorium dark for most of the time so we can keep the shows running.)
Just like last year, the backstage area will be set aside for the buy-sell-swap tables and for work on ion lasers. And we'll keep the main curtains on the stage closed, so people can mill around backstage and work on stuff as needed. We will also have access to the upstairs classroom area if we need it.
I'm sure there are a bunch of things that I've forgotten, but when folks remind me I'll post them in this thread! For now, I'd like to get some quick feedback on the cafeteria idea, and I'd also like to know who's going to be able to make it this year. The $60 entrance fee can be set via paypal to adburns@sc.rr.com.
Edit:
Here's a list of the people who have signed up so far:
Buffo
Bradfo69
PolishedBall
Platinum
Displaser
DZ
Firstlight_Mike (Mike Dunn)
MassiveSound
Araugh
X-Laser (Dan Goldsmith)
Flecom
Stuka
Pangolin (Bill Benner)
JohnYayas
Icecruncher
Chexmex
Hakzaw1
Gottaluvlasers
Telmnstr
Whitcher88
Ragdoll
AMCAAT
Jeff (Jeffreythe00)
Mariomaster
Djpsych
Dr Evil
Cfavreau
DJMatt
Laserman121
Jimboy3625
David Walker (Lasernet)
Javier Ramirez (Lasernet)
Owen Murphy (X-laser)
Planters
Imagelight
Dkumpula
T minus 5 days and counting 'till setup...
Reminder: shirt order is now closed. You can still sign up for SELEM, but you probably won't get a shirt.
See attached liability waiver, which you will need to sign upon your arrival at SELEM.
Adam