Talk:Laser lighting display

Laser Floyd: The Wall is the most amazing laser light show ever.

Why the Pink Floyd edit was removed

Two sentences were recently added in the Origins section about Pink Floyd: " Pink Floyd is another well known band who incorporated high output 50W copper-vapor lasers into their outstanding shows. These lasers were the first and one of the only used in a rock concert application."

I am not against expanding the article to include information like this. But I removed this particular edit for the following reasons:

The first sentence was unclear. It made it seem like PF is "another" band who used copper-vapor, implying that Blue Oyster Cult also used these.
The second sentence was also unclear. It made it seem like copper-vapor lasers were "the first" used in a rock concert application, and are "one of the only" types of lasers used in a rock concert application. Of course, neither statement is true.
The first sentence contains an assertion that the shows were "outstanding". This is a strong opinion. More neutral wording might be "impressive shows" or "special-effects filled shows".
Pink Floyd's use of copper-vapor was in the 1990s. It was long after lasers had been established as a rock concert effect. (E.g., the edit was not related to the paragraph where it appeared, about the origins of laser displays.)
The edit was also not related to the surrounding material about the origins of US safety concerns and regulations. Pink Floyd's use of copper-vapor was safe -- it did not enter the audience -- and thus there was no controversy or undue concern about their use of this of laser.
The only thing new about Pink Floyd's use of copper-vapor was the type of laser and the color of the beam (gold). Although interesting, this did not change the laser display world much. Copper-vapor is so rarely used that it does not rate the importance given to it by this particular edit.

Overall, this material was too detailed for the current state of the article.

If one wants to discuss the early history of laser concerts, other pioneering bands such as the Who (with Holoco) and ELO (with Laser Media) should also be discussed. Otherwise the impression is given that Pink Floyd was the sole pioneer.

If one wants to discuss laser types and their use for displays ... well, there are many lasers which have had much more of an impact on displays, besides copper-vapor. In rough order, this would be he-ne's (early experimentation), argon and krypton ion lasers, Nd-YAG, and solid-state types such as DPSS. Copper-vapor is interesting but certainly not mainstream.

The intent of the edit is good. It is always nice to see people contributing to this article. I just felt that for various reasons, the two sentences added were not relevant to the location they were added, or to the current "broad overview" state of the article. I look forward to when the article has more detail so that Pink Floyd and copper-vapor use can be put into proper context.

--Pmurph5 00:02, 23 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Suggestion

"Water screen" and "Waterscreen" could forward to this article, because Wikipedia now has no information on that subject. For those of you who don't know what a waterscreen is, check out this link. The article could have a small section about waterscreens. --82.171.70.54 (talk) 04:32, 7 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why WikiProject Physics classification was removed

Someone tagged this article as being "within the scope of WikiProject Physics, which collaborates on articles related to physics."

I removed this tag, because laser lighting displays (e.g., rock-concert-type vector-scanning laser shows) have only a very tenuous relationship to physics. Yes, these laser shows do use lasers as their light source, but that would be like adding computer monitors to WikiProject Physics because they use electricity and emit light.

One criteria is whether research and academic physicists are involved in this field. The answer is no. The closest that physicists get to this field is in developing and improving various types of lasers. For example, physicists may research different ways of creating laser light, but this is not done specifically for laser lighting displays. Some laser research may be done to help other laser display fields, such as raster-scanned laser TVs, which need small, powerful laser sources. But even here the physics connection to laser lighting displays is tenuous at best.

Another criteria is whether a physics degree, either basic (undergraduate) or advanced (Masters, Ph.D.) is required, beneficial or frequently found by those working in the field. Such a degree is very rare in the laser lighting display field, such as persons involved in the International Laser Display Association.

Creating the lasers and beam controllers (scanners, color-control devices, etc.) used in laser lighting displays requires knowledge of optical engineering and electronics. But again, this is not physics-specific, so I have removed the tag.

--Pmurph5 (talk) 18:35, 9 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Specfic facts needed

"use" by a band is questioned. Did the band's employees buy or rent the laser, figure out how to interface a positioner & modulator, etc? Or did they hire a company or consultant to do that? If the latter is the case, the information should be located and included. Particularly useful for the various technical milestones.173.73.179.150 (talk) 07:01, 11 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]