Difference between revisions of "Singing Choir"
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I came up with a concept while sitting in the choir loft in church one Sunday morning, and I drew a little sketch in the margin of my program | I came up with a concept while sitting in the choir loft in church one Sunday morning, and I drew a little sketch in the margin of my program | ||
− | [[File:1-choirconcept.jpg | | + | [[File:1-choirconcept.jpg | 200px]] |
I found a graphic on the Internet that was close to the vision that I had for the choir, so I made a screen capture of that. | I found a graphic on the Internet that was close to the vision that I had for the choir, so I made a screen capture of that. | ||
− | [[File:2-choirgraphic.jpg | | + | [[File:2-choirgraphic.jpg | 200px]] |
I needed a way to enlarge the relatively small graphic, so I used a digital projector to project it up on a wall. I taped several sheets of newspaper together as my "canvas" so I could outline the elements I wanted to make in wire. | I needed a way to enlarge the relatively small graphic, so I used a digital projector to project it up on a wall. I taped several sheets of newspaper together as my "canvas" so I could outline the elements I wanted to make in wire. | ||
− | [[File:3-enlarged.JPG | | + | [[File:3-enlarged.JPG | 200px]] |
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+ | I used 9-gauge wire from Lowe's that came in 50-foot spools. It's very stiff but bendable and substantial enough to weld, and it's rather inexpensive. I used two spools for all the elements of this frame. | ||
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+ | [[File:4-wire.JPG | 200px]] | ||
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+ | Ping pong tables come in really handy for big projects like this! I laid out the paper, and because I wanted to make each frame out of a single piece of wire, I needed to know how long each wire should be. I used string and taped it onto the outline of each element and then used each string to measure the length of wire and rope light I needed. The string also provided good practice for determining how I would wire the frames with a single, continuous length of rope light. | ||
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+ | [[File:5-measuring.JPG | 200px]] | ||
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+ | After cutting and bending the wire into the shape I needed, I welded each piece together. | ||
+ | |||
+ | [[File:6-welded.JPG | 200px]] |
Revision as of 15:09, 16 May 2015
This turned out to be a pretty sizeable project, and it takes two people to move it around because it's so unwieldy and heavy, but it's been a popular part of this display for quite a few years. I don't use it every year, but because it uses rope light, it's super-low maintenance and fills up a lot of visual space.
I came up with a concept while sitting in the choir loft in church one Sunday morning, and I drew a little sketch in the margin of my program
I found a graphic on the Internet that was close to the vision that I had for the choir, so I made a screen capture of that.
I needed a way to enlarge the relatively small graphic, so I used a digital projector to project it up on a wall. I taped several sheets of newspaper together as my "canvas" so I could outline the elements I wanted to make in wire.
I used 9-gauge wire from Lowe's that came in 50-foot spools. It's very stiff but bendable and substantial enough to weld, and it's rather inexpensive. I used two spools for all the elements of this frame.
Ping pong tables come in really handy for big projects like this! I laid out the paper, and because I wanted to make each frame out of a single piece of wire, I needed to know how long each wire should be. I used string and taped it onto the outline of each element and then used each string to measure the length of wire and rope light I needed. The string also provided good practice for determining how I would wire the frames with a single, continuous length of rope light.
After cutting and bending the wire into the shape I needed, I welded each piece together.