I sure some my fellow old farts will know what I'm talking about. I used to do these back in the day. I used standard techniques...overhead projector, died water. Then I took it up a notch. I had custom glass plates cut so I could do layering. I switched to mineral oils and procion dyes for more vivid colors. I even started using pyrex pie dishes so I could float objects, blow bubbles etc.
Here's what I'm wondering.....is there some digital video program or plugin that can emulate this and make it look organic? I want it to be interactive with the music. I've tried several things but they just looked too stiff and modern. I want that goopy, soupy, ultra trippy look.
At one point I finally stopped trying to replicate it and just projected videos of the real thing....ok, but not interactive and there are just so many vids out there. I've really not been keeping up with digital audio advances. I'm hoping some of you have. So....any thoughts?
60's Style Liquid Light Shows
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- KVRAF
- 3030 posts since 12 Mar, 2002 from Central NY
the secrets to old age: Faster horses, Richer Women, Bigger CPU's
https://soundcloud.com/cristofe-chabot/sets/main
https://soundcloud.com/cristofe-chabot/sets/main
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- KVRAF
- 2331 posts since 3 Sep, 2005 from Outer Bongolia
Yeah, I was really surprised that I couldn’t find any digital simulation of the liquid light show stuff either. You seem to have a good background for the real deal, but I didn’t know anything about how it was done until I found this YouTube channel:
One idea that does make it a little easier to capture than the old days is that now you can just use an LED light table under the squish plates and mount a digital camera above it rather than using an actual overhead projector and trying to capture that off a screen. The pros all still use nestled glass clock faces for the squish plates (still relatively easy to buy in sets specifically paired for liquid light show use on eBay). Plus now it’s easy to get slo-mo and stuff too not to mention all the digital effects and color grading, and try side lighting the liquid squish plates and using the camera at slight angles to really get it to pop in 3D.
I’m really interested if there is a digital sim that I missed too.
One idea that does make it a little easier to capture than the old days is that now you can just use an LED light table under the squish plates and mount a digital camera above it rather than using an actual overhead projector and trying to capture that off a screen. The pros all still use nestled glass clock faces for the squish plates (still relatively easy to buy in sets specifically paired for liquid light show use on eBay). Plus now it’s easy to get slo-mo and stuff too not to mention all the digital effects and color grading, and try side lighting the liquid squish plates and using the camera at slight angles to really get it to pop in 3D.
I’m really interested if there is a digital sim that I missed too.
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- KVRAF
- Topic Starter
- 3030 posts since 12 Mar, 2002 from Central NY
Thanks for weighing in! Yeah, I know that the real thing is still being done. I just don't want to gear up to do it again in hardware. One because of the cost and two because you can't run a liquid light show and be onstage at the same time. I am rather surprised that no one, (that I know of anyway),
has come up with a digital sim either in standalone or as a plugin for Magix Vegas or Adobe Premiere Pro. I tried Edirol's Motion Dive Tokyo in the way back but it really wasn't what I'm after. A M8 suggested Resolume Arena so I'll take a look at that.....but I get the feeling it won't do what I want either. I do have a pretty good archive of vids of the real thing, so maybe I'll just take the easy way
out and play those back with a laptop and a projector.
has come up with a digital sim either in standalone or as a plugin for Magix Vegas or Adobe Premiere Pro. I tried Edirol's Motion Dive Tokyo in the way back but it really wasn't what I'm after. A M8 suggested Resolume Arena so I'll take a look at that.....but I get the feeling it won't do what I want either. I do have a pretty good archive of vids of the real thing, so maybe I'll just take the easy way
out and play those back with a laptop and a projector.
the secrets to old age: Faster horses, Richer Women, Bigger CPU's
https://soundcloud.com/cristofe-chabot/sets/main
https://soundcloud.com/cristofe-chabot/sets/main
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- KVRAF
- 2331 posts since 3 Sep, 2005 from Outer Bongolia
I understand, and it would be great to have a good liquid light sim that could automatically react to audio. But if such a thing doesn’t exist I was thinking more along the line that you could make new video clips that were beat synched to your set and then use those with your laptop.
It is kind of fun and you can get a huge pro set of clock glass for under $100 (much less for a small set) and one of the up-and-coming light show crews interviewed on the Liquid Light Lab channel said one of the biggest improvements they had made recently was switching from expensive dye to cheap food coloring and just using a lot more of it. You can get a big A2 or A3 size LED light box thing for well under a hundred too, so it can be almost as cheap as software if you have a decent camera (and a magic arm mount or some such, also available on the cheap), though not nearly as handy.
Not only does there seem to be no Liquid Light sims, there are only a few sims of analog video synths available, which really blows my mind since they are all about oscillators and filters and stuff just like virtual analog audio synths.
Edit: with something like Resolume you could definitely use liquid light videos and mix them with other effects in ways that would interact with your audio, in fact almost all the OG hippie light show guys that appear on the Liquid Light Lab shows use Resolume in their shows now, but I’m pretty sure Resolume doesn’t directly simulate liquid light effects. Resolume can be used to mix many different visualizer programs too, like there is some killer MilkDrop derived software out there for free or very cheap.
Also, if you’re only using one projector you probably really only need Resolume Avenue, Arena costs significantly more and I think it mostly just adds multi-projector mapping and blending.
It is kind of fun and you can get a huge pro set of clock glass for under $100 (much less for a small set) and one of the up-and-coming light show crews interviewed on the Liquid Light Lab channel said one of the biggest improvements they had made recently was switching from expensive dye to cheap food coloring and just using a lot more of it. You can get a big A2 or A3 size LED light box thing for well under a hundred too, so it can be almost as cheap as software if you have a decent camera (and a magic arm mount or some such, also available on the cheap), though not nearly as handy.
Not only does there seem to be no Liquid Light sims, there are only a few sims of analog video synths available, which really blows my mind since they are all about oscillators and filters and stuff just like virtual analog audio synths.
Edit: with something like Resolume you could definitely use liquid light videos and mix them with other effects in ways that would interact with your audio, in fact almost all the OG hippie light show guys that appear on the Liquid Light Lab shows use Resolume in their shows now, but I’m pretty sure Resolume doesn’t directly simulate liquid light effects. Resolume can be used to mix many different visualizer programs too, like there is some killer MilkDrop derived software out there for free or very cheap.
Also, if you’re only using one projector you probably really only need Resolume Avenue, Arena costs significantly more and I think it mostly just adds multi-projector mapping and blending.