SantaPaws
11-12-2008, 10:34 AM
Snowball Fighting Snowmen HOW-TO
I had made my snowball fighting snowman back in 2005. I had seen many people make this awesome Christmas Prop and I wanted to see if I could do the same. I had already a controller that I bought from www.animatedlighting.com which was an LC-16 that has 16 channels. My goal was to make it look like the snowmen were fighting it out with snowballs.
Software.
I used Animated Lighting's software to control the two snowmen. But I had to create my own program to do so. I don't have the list of program with me, but it is very simple to make. I made sure the program did a random number to pick out which snowman would throw the ball. Then another random number was generated to decide what the snowball route would be. Either going over their head, in their face, or hitting the ground right before them. Then if the snowman hit the other in the face with the snowball, then the program would start throwing the snowballs faster untill it got to a certain speed. The speed would increment when ever a snowman got hit in the face with the snowball.
Buying the poles
The first thing that I did was goto Home Depot for poles to build my structure. I bought galvanized poles that you can get at Home Depot. The problem was the poles were only 4 foot tall, so I had to buy couplers so that I could add another 4 foot length to the poles to reach 8 foot. Also used were 2 – 4 ft poles. When finished these poles would be 8 foot tall. There were a total of 6 - 8 ft poles that I needed to build and 2 – 4ft poles that were attached to the main poles.
Connecting the fence to the poles.
4 of the 8 ft poles were used to make the snowmen. Seen in the picture below. I bought wire fencing about 4 ft long and attached them to two of the poles to make my snowman. I had to use two pieces of the 4 ft long wire since it was only 4 x 4; connecting them together gave me my 8 x 4 foot that I needed to make my snowman. I did the same to the other two poles to make the 2nd snowman. The fencing will be used to hold up the rope lights. I used larger wire ties to connect the fence to the poles.
Making the snowman
What I did next is bought a role of white rope lights. I bought mine on line but you might find better deals at other places. To mix it up a little, I also bought a few other colors to show the differences in the snowmen. Basically making a blue hat for one snowman, and red for other; blue didn't look as good. But it still turned out ok. When I first built the snowmen, I started with the body and the parts that wouldn’t blink on and off. If you get what I mean. Meaning that what ever lights would be on all the times, that is what I started with. Other portions of the snowmen I did later, like the arms because they would be controlled by my controller and I wanted to make sure I had room for them.
So to make my snowman I made a figure 8 on the fence and tied tie it down as I was going. Once I got the figure of my snowman, I needed to cut the rest of the rope light off. But remember while do so, it has to be done right, or that portion of the rope light won’t work. The best how –to for making your own rope lights is http://www.planetchristmas.com/RopeLight.htm
I think it is every 3 feet you are looking to cut the rope light. You should be able to see where it ends if you look carefully at the rope light. It has to be cut there or you will have issues. Most of the time you can make it easy on yourself if you buy extra couplers with the rope lights. If you buy on line, they will give you the option to buy extra couplers so that you can cut your rope light and then just connect this coupler on the end that normally has it own plug.
Making the animated parts
Next thing I had to focus on was the animated parts of the snowmen. Since I only had 16 channels for my controller, I couldn’t go too hog wild making things animated. Each snowman needed to be able to look like he is throwing the snowball, so I had to make the action look like he is throwing the snowball, plus the snowball traveling to the other snowman and any other effects that I needed. Such as the snowman getting hit in the face. I think by looking at the video, you should be able to tell how I set up the arm and such to make it look like he was throwing the snowball.
Snowball fight drawing
http://www.christmaskennel.nakedfrog.net/snowfight.jpg
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y260/lovermonkey/Christmas/2005c.jpg
Video
http://www.christmaskennel.nakedfrog.net/snowman.wmv
I had made my snowball fighting snowman back in 2005. I had seen many people make this awesome Christmas Prop and I wanted to see if I could do the same. I had already a controller that I bought from www.animatedlighting.com which was an LC-16 that has 16 channels. My goal was to make it look like the snowmen were fighting it out with snowballs.
Software.
I used Animated Lighting's software to control the two snowmen. But I had to create my own program to do so. I don't have the list of program with me, but it is very simple to make. I made sure the program did a random number to pick out which snowman would throw the ball. Then another random number was generated to decide what the snowball route would be. Either going over their head, in their face, or hitting the ground right before them. Then if the snowman hit the other in the face with the snowball, then the program would start throwing the snowballs faster untill it got to a certain speed. The speed would increment when ever a snowman got hit in the face with the snowball.
Buying the poles
The first thing that I did was goto Home Depot for poles to build my structure. I bought galvanized poles that you can get at Home Depot. The problem was the poles were only 4 foot tall, so I had to buy couplers so that I could add another 4 foot length to the poles to reach 8 foot. Also used were 2 – 4 ft poles. When finished these poles would be 8 foot tall. There were a total of 6 - 8 ft poles that I needed to build and 2 – 4ft poles that were attached to the main poles.
Connecting the fence to the poles.
4 of the 8 ft poles were used to make the snowmen. Seen in the picture below. I bought wire fencing about 4 ft long and attached them to two of the poles to make my snowman. I had to use two pieces of the 4 ft long wire since it was only 4 x 4; connecting them together gave me my 8 x 4 foot that I needed to make my snowman. I did the same to the other two poles to make the 2nd snowman. The fencing will be used to hold up the rope lights. I used larger wire ties to connect the fence to the poles.
Making the snowman
What I did next is bought a role of white rope lights. I bought mine on line but you might find better deals at other places. To mix it up a little, I also bought a few other colors to show the differences in the snowmen. Basically making a blue hat for one snowman, and red for other; blue didn't look as good. But it still turned out ok. When I first built the snowmen, I started with the body and the parts that wouldn’t blink on and off. If you get what I mean. Meaning that what ever lights would be on all the times, that is what I started with. Other portions of the snowmen I did later, like the arms because they would be controlled by my controller and I wanted to make sure I had room for them.
So to make my snowman I made a figure 8 on the fence and tied tie it down as I was going. Once I got the figure of my snowman, I needed to cut the rest of the rope light off. But remember while do so, it has to be done right, or that portion of the rope light won’t work. The best how –to for making your own rope lights is http://www.planetchristmas.com/RopeLight.htm
I think it is every 3 feet you are looking to cut the rope light. You should be able to see where it ends if you look carefully at the rope light. It has to be cut there or you will have issues. Most of the time you can make it easy on yourself if you buy extra couplers with the rope lights. If you buy on line, they will give you the option to buy extra couplers so that you can cut your rope light and then just connect this coupler on the end that normally has it own plug.
Making the animated parts
Next thing I had to focus on was the animated parts of the snowmen. Since I only had 16 channels for my controller, I couldn’t go too hog wild making things animated. Each snowman needed to be able to look like he is throwing the snowball, so I had to make the action look like he is throwing the snowball, plus the snowball traveling to the other snowman and any other effects that I needed. Such as the snowman getting hit in the face. I think by looking at the video, you should be able to tell how I set up the arm and such to make it look like he was throwing the snowball.
Snowball fight drawing
http://www.christmaskennel.nakedfrog.net/snowfight.jpg
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y260/lovermonkey/Christmas/2005c.jpg
Video
http://www.christmaskennel.nakedfrog.net/snowman.wmv