FLEM !!!!

[flecom]

Nah... More like 12 hours tops. In fact, Google maps says it's 11 hrs and 54 min from downtown Miami, FL to Newton, NC. But I've found that google maps is often a tad conservative in their estimates. I always get there faster. (And no, I don't drive more than ~8 mph over the limit.)

ah stop it! i dont want to drive! lol... i will probably convince myself to go by then... maybe get some friends together from the planetarium to join...

We've had people drive farther than that to get to a laser enthusiast's meeting before. At SELEM 2007 we had two people that drove from Michigan! Trust me, it's worth the drive.

!

Take Friday and Monday off from work that weekend (August 16th and 17th) and make it a 4 day weekend. Leave early in the morning on Friday and drive straight through. You'll get there in time to get a hotel and join us for the pre-SELEM party at 6 PM at the Artist's cafe. Then leave Monday morning after everything is over and drive back to Florida. You'll have time to unload everything and still be in bed in plenty of time to be fresh for work Tuesday morning.

work? whos worried about work?! im worried about my girlfriend killing me!!!

DZ has a pair of amps he picked up from Clandestiny. Don't know the manufacturer or the detailed specs, but I know they'll do 1000 watts each when in bridged-mono mode. So that's 2KW right there.

well, if its watts you want i can get watts, the crown amps i have are either 1200 or 1600 watts, dont remember... but i think the Altecs sound better... something about those brute force power supplies and rows and rows of TO-3 can transistors

At SELEM 2007 we only had one of those amps, so we had to run it stereo. That meant we only had 500 watts total (250W per side), and it wasn't enough.

depends on speaker placement, efficiency of speakers, theres a lot more than watts

2KW would be good, but 4KW ought to fill the room nicely. We can use the house speakers in addition to the ones that David has.

jee i would hope so! but again, a lot depends on speakers

Probably not needed. The venue in North Carolina has a nice 24 channel mixer that we used for part of the first day, but then we decided to abandon it because all our gear was on stage, while the mixer was at the back of the auditorium. No one wanted to sit at the mixer panel!

hrmm, wonder why hehe

Plus we didn't have the adapters to use all the house mic wiring on the stage, and running 100 ft of RCA cable back to the mixer really sucks! So we hot-swapped cables on stage and had a single RCA cable pair that fed the main mixer. (This is another reason why I'm going to bring my own mixer to SELEM this year - so we'll have a mixer on stage with all the equipment! No more hot-swapping cables...)

holy noise batman, you definately dont want to run unbalanced audio that far!

get yourself some XLRs!

[buffo]

ah stop it! i dont want to drive! lol... i will probably convince myself to go by then... maybe get some friends together from the planetarium to join...

Yeah, it will make a great road trip...

work? whos worried about work?! im worried about my girlfriend killing me!!!

So bring her along and get a room at one of the bed and breakfasts in the area. Nice and cozy, and all for about 90 bucks per night. She'll love it, even if she's not into lasers. (Charlotte is 50 min away by car - she can go shopping while you geek out.)

well, if its watts you want i can get watts, the crown amps i have are either 1200 or 1600 watts, dont remember... but i think the Altecs sound better... something about those brute force power supplies and rows and rows of TO-3 can transistors

Well, we *are* trying to fill an auditorium with sound... The house sound system is lame, which is why we brought our own. (Though there was some talk about upgrades... Need to ask Reggie about that.)

depends on speaker placement, efficiency of speakers, theres a lot more than watts

True, but you're not going to fill a 500 seat theater with sound if you've only got 100 watts to play with. (Or, at the very least, you'll have no bass.) Speakers can only do so much magic with low power amps. After that, you need some big guns.

holy noise batman, you definately dont want to run unbalanced audio that far!

Like I said - we only ran that way for a short while. Though noise wasn't really a problem, actually. (60Hz was the only issue, and we simply lifted the ground on the audio on our end to break the loop.) All the dimmers were off, so there wasn't a lot of noise in the environment for those cables to pick up.

Besides - the bottom line is that when you've got an event like that, you do what you have to in order to have sound. We made it work with that 100ft of cable, even though it wasn't an ideal solution. Though later on we just shit-canned the house audio entirely because it was just too cumbersome. However, that meant that we only had good sound on stage. (And by "good", I mean "OK".) Next year will be better!

Adam

[allthatwhichis]

It is not the soundI am worried about there. It is the AC...

[buffo]

The A/C? As in, the Air Conditioning? It works just fine so long as you remember to reset the air handler every 6 hours!

Yeah, that was an issue at SELEM 2007 though. I'll be sure to remind Reggie of the reset switch. We were fine on Saturday, but Sunday it got really hot. (Reggie left for a couple hours, and that's about when the timer ran out. The dude he left in charge didn't know about the switch.)

I'm actually concerned about fog this time. I'd like to fill the whole audience area with fog this time, so we can send beams out over the seats. However, given that the ceiling is so high, I'm thinking that we'll need at least two, or possibly even three of those Antari 1200Z foggers to do the job. I've got one, and I think Fred has one as well. But I don't know of anyone else that has one. Might have to make do with a shitload of smaller foggers in a pinch...

Sound system is coming together though. I'll have an even nicer mixer to bring, thanks to a deal that Flecom and I are working out. (Gonna go back to Guitar Center tomorrow and return the Behringer I just bought!) Likewise, DZ should have a pair of those large amps from Clandestiny, and if Flecom can make it to the event, he may be able to bring some more high power amps. True, we'll still need speakers, but I'm working on that.

Should have live webcams just like we did for FLEM, though I'll probably need Reggie to run a drop of Cat-5 cable into the auditorium for us. (Wireless lan won't reach into the auditorium.) This time the sound will be much better on the broadcast too!

Thinking about setting things up a little differently this time. Considering moving the tech support, repairs, tuning, eating, and general kibitzing to the lighted areas back stage. That way the stage and auditorium areas can be kept mostly dark so the lasers can run all the time.

But then again, who knows? These things tend to be rather fluid affairs anyway, with plans changing all the time. So I don't know if it will pan out this way or not. But I've been noodling on the idea for a while now.

Adam

[flecom]

Should have live webcams just like we did for FLEM, though I'll probably need Reggie to run a drop of Cat-5 cable into the auditorium for us. (Wireless lan won't reach into the auditorium.) This time the sound will be much better on the broadcast too!

well, how fast is the network connection? if its less than 10mbits then wireless vs wired shouldent really make a difference if your not sharing files computer to computer...

i have some cisco access points and wireless bridges (wireless to wired, so you can hook up regular desktops via ethernet to the wireless bridge thats assoicated with the wireless lan)

would be easier than running ethernet everywhere... but if we want more bandwith for sharing (of legally aquired data) i have a bunch of HP gigabit switches (J4108's and 4104's) from my lan party days

[buffo]

well, how fast is the network connection? if its less than 10mbits then wireless vs wired shouldent really make a difference if your not sharing files computer to computer...

Bandwidth isn't really the issue. The problem is range on the wireless access point that they have. They've got good coverage out in the lobby, but none in the auditorium itself. I figured if we get them to run a drop of Cat-5 into the auditorium we can hook up a switch in there and use it to feed everyone. (Or at least to feed the webcams for the live broadcast.)

i have some cisco access points and wireless bridges (wireless to wired, so you can hook up regular desktops via ethernet to the wireless bridge thats assoicated with the wireless lan)

What we would need is a wireless repeater (a bridge that is wireless to wireless) to extend the range of the WAP they have out in the lobby. And given the construction of the auditorium, I'm not sure that's really feasible. (It's an old building with massive cinderblock walls, so signal propigation is terrible.) That's why I think a single drop will be better for us.

would be easier than running ethernet everywhere.

If we want wireless (to get away from a spaghetti pile of cat-5 cable) we could always have a wireless router configured as a WAP inside the auditorium. But we'd still need to feed it from the single drop that we pull from their head end...

if we want more bandwith for sharing (of legally aquired data) i have a bunch of HP gigabit switches (J4108's and 4104's) from my lan party days

That's a good idea. I've got an 8-port N-way fast ethernet switch, but a gigabit switch would be really nice.

Adam

[allthatwhichis]

I guess I have yet to comment on the meet. Again, it was awesome. (No access to smilies on this PC so I'll have to edit it for them laster.)

As usual, Paul's facility served our purpose superbly, and even blessed us with two of his smaller argons with some big ass, heavy, damn beam tables. How or why Adam and I ended up tossing them bitches on top of the scafold platform I still don't know. They weight as much as I do. Next time we will know what line is the DSL line... And Spec better show up to unleash his master plan.

Adam did seem to conduct from center stage. At this point there doesn't need to be any "setting" up of the mett before hand. A date is set and the ball needs little more than that to keep rolling. SELEM II may be a littel different. ANd although neither of us made any "video recordings" he kept us live from his machine on the aircard while the three phone guys and one cable guy could find a damn live data line out of 25 for hours... Thanks you again Adam for staring this tradition.

Thanks to Fred for the scanner and harddrive. I jope the lasagna and small tour of the area on our way to and from the store was a fair trade. I still need to glance and that thumbdrive. Thank Dee for coming. You saw how long the boss stayed after everyone got doen with the lasagna.

A very BIG thank you to David for the DT40 that is now my Y galvo and paired with a Scnpro30 as my X. It was/is a life saver... well, at least $500 or so for a new set of scanners. Between him and Bill's tuning, (Thank you Bill!), my projector's graphics have never looked better. When you get done at school, you have a date with my little projecotr to look forward to.

Thank you to everyone else who showed up. I swear next time my projector will be doing more than getting serviced... I forgot a few names, but have screennames to shout... flecom, Imagelight, Aron, and Patrick (who don't and probably will never have screen names...), and of course Ray (Pitts). Cannot forget the name of the record for longest distance travelled for any laser meet anywhere. And if I forgot anyone... sorry, it is 3 am, and I need to go to bed.

To those who didn't who up... I have a smilie for you when I can get access to it... A few have excuses... The rest, you know who you are...

[buffo]

As usual, Paul's facility served our purpose superbly, and even blessed us with two of his smaller argons with some big ass, heavy, damn beam tables. How or why Adam and I ended up tossing them bitches on top of the scafold platform I still don't know. They weight as much as I do.

HAHA! That's what you get for volunteering to help set up! Though I have to admit that I sort of ambushed you into that. Also, I *knew* how heavy those things were going to be because I lifted the one he brought to the original FLEM we had back in January of 2007! Plus I weigh nearly twice as much as you do, so it wasn't as much of a challenge for me. (Though you're right - they're still heavy!)

Adam did seem to conduct from center stage.

Ray mentioned that... So did a buddy of mine that saw some of Frank's (Flecom's) awesome pictures. I never considered that it might make me look like a conductor. That wasn't my intent. I just figured that sitting behind that big post was a pain in the ass, but since I had a large flat panel monitor anyway I'd go ahead and take that spot and just sit the monitor behind the post. I didn't have too much trouble looking around the post to see the screen. (Truthfully most of the time I was on the other side looking back towards the projectors!)

At this point there doesn't need to be any "setting" up of the meet before hand. A date is set and the ball needs little more than that to keep rolling.

Eh - still some coordination required to get everyone there at the same time and be sure we've got sound, fog, power, and plenty of lasers. But you're right - we've got it all down to a science now. It was a big help to have Friday afternoon available to unload my gear. I was able to set everything up and unpack all the tools ahead of time. That saved time on Saturday morning.

And although neither of us made any "video recordings" he kept us live from his machine on the aircard while the three phone guys and one cable guy could find a damn live data line out of 25 for hours.

HEHE. I couldn't figure that one out. We had plenty of talent present, yet it took us nearly 2/3 of the day to get the damn DSL working. What a bunch of loosers! At least we did finally get it.

.. Thanks you again Adam for staring this tradition.

Aw hell... Thanks to everyone that came to the event for supporting it. Otherwise we wouldn't have this tradition!

Can't wait for SELEM this summer...

Adam

[DZ]

Flecom, you definately need to join us at SELEM! The theater is fantastic, the acoustics were great. I only had a small set of MTX speakers and I thought they did a decent job. This time around though, if some plans come together, we'll have a little more punch! The amps that I picked up from Clan are Ashly, 1350W into 4 ohms bridge mono.

[mliptack]

How about some L-acoustics dV-DOSC and some Lab Gruppen Amps using the new Lake processors? Any takers? If I could go - I would try to swing something like that!