Keeping traffic moving - Synchronizing Light Shows. Read Only. No more posting. - PlanetChristmas! Forums. Read Only. We've moved to http://talk.planetchristmas.com - The Forums of PlanetChristmas have moved to http://talk.PlanetChristmas.com
The common theme with computerized displays is starting to be "how do I keep traffic moving" and/or "I have too much traffic and am starting to get complaints!"
I'd like to start a thread where we can brainstorm traffic management as it pertains to show design and programming.
I'll start by saying that I know the conventional wisdom is to run a show, then have some "down time" with the idea that traffic will flush out. I've never tried that, because I am afraid that this would actually make things worse, as follows:
There is now an expectation that people stay for the duration of the show. They might feel that they will miss something if they leave.
In the "in-between show" period, you can either broadcast an announcement that "the show will start in 10 minutes" but that defeats the purpose -- it might cause traffic to wait for 10 minutes PLUS the length of your show. If you instead say nothing, then people might not even know you have synchronized lights and will just miss out on the whole experience.
Instead, my technique for the past three years is to have "a bunch of songs in a row". My entire "show" is about 50 minutes this year, but I don't expect anyone to stick around that long. Instead, it's like a radio station -- you can surf to it, listen for awhile, and leave when you're ready. Some people stay for a minute or two, many stay for 10 minutes or more, some actually do stay for the entire show (but it's rare, thankfully, or I'd have serious traffic issues).
So key ingredients to my philosophy are:
No "show" as such, but a bunch of different songs rotating. There is no "start" and "end" of the show (other than when the lights come on and go off for the night) it's just some songs that loop.
Each song, while unique in character, involves all of my lights, so there isn't any part of the display that people will "miss" by not seeing a particular song.
After a song or three, you get a good feel for the display, and are pretty much ready to move on. This is not a bad thing, because if everyone stays too long, it causes traffic problems. For the minority that DO stay longer there is more music to keep them interested.
With all of this, there's traffic leaving as more traffic comes into its place. The other method is more "batch driven": Cars that miss the start of the show will just have to wait for another cycle, causing more waiting in the long run.
But... it seems that most of you do the "batch show method" so maybe I'm missing something. Let's discuss it...
I use some similar techniques for my show, which was 42 minutes this year. I can't turn all my lights on for each song, but do have the playlist sort of grouped in "threes". If they stay for three songs (pop song, kid song, TSO sequencing show-off song), they will pretty much have a sampling of the entire show.
I put one item on the playlist that I thought would move the traffic along for sure. Steven Curtis Chapman has a track of a little girl reading Luke (the true Christmas story). No blink, just steady golds, a star, and the nativity. I have yet to see anyone drive off while that was playing.
I simply reduced my playlist to 2 or thee songs. People get the idea pretty quick that it's going to repeat. Not sure how many have figured it out, but I do change the songs each hour.
I had no choice, Sunday before Christmas, I had 7 cars on the street for 10+ minutes. It only got worse. Until that point, I could run all of my songs in a row.
My thinking was going down the line of just 2 or 3 songs ... as soon as they get a "repeat" they're likely to move on.
But the repetition could create insanity here and for my neighbors so I was thinking of having different sets of songs for different nights of the week for variety.
Which I've now revised to using probably the whole set of songs (maybe a dozen) but including a very obvious "repeater" every couple of songs. I think that would be sufficient to cause people to think they'd heard the cycle and move along ... and still there would be enough variety to reduce the insanity factor.
Example: (assume both A and B are easily recognizable when they repeat): A, C, D, A, E, B, F, G, B, H, A, I, J, A, C, etc.
Well, I'm coming to the realization that the skits, in between songs, is hurting my traffic flow. It's hard for me to imagine my show with just animation and a music show, without the skits. I love them! Ever since I saw Terry Dykes show, I've been trying to balance my display with all three. (animation, skits, and synced music). Maybe I'm trying for too much? I don't know. This year I have a synced music song, a skit, synced music song, skit (etc). Well, the total show is around 45 mins, and usually people stick around to see what is going to happen next. At the end of the entire show, it says that this is the last song of the show, and the show will repeat until 11pm, or whatever time I set. I really don't want to change it, but I might be forced to.
well, this is only my 2nd year of synching. las t year was relatively small and not too impressive, by my standards. this year, i tripled my lights. since the first night, the traffic was steady, 10 cars an hour or so. last week, with zero tv, radio or newspaper coverage, i easily had 30 - 35 cars an hour come thru. thursday night, i turned into my subdivision about 1030 at night. well, actually, i TRIED to turn into it. the cars were lined up, on the side of the road and in orderly fashion from the subdivision entrance, all the way down to the front of my house, about 4 blocks away. there were limos, hummer limos, church buses. it was unbelievable. what was even more striking is that 80% of them were on cell phones, quite probably calling friends. it really scared me a little. i am fortunate that the main street into the subdivision is the only way in and out and that the road to my house will loop around back to the entrance. so , they can turn down my street, see the display and continue on and around, back to the front entrance. i wondered if i should have had signs up closer to the front of the sub to give people info. i need to come up with ideas to deal with the shear numbers. the traffic was like that each night last week up to and including christmas night. i ran the display until 1am so that everybody that waited could see it. i only have 4 songs, a nativity scene i use with the charlie brown recording and an intro. people pretty much sat thru the whole thing, 15 mins and then moved on. the main thing that i noticed was people blocking a neighbor's driveway. the other thing i noticed happening is somebody coming around from the backside and pulling up in front of the house, blocking the view of the cars on the other side of the road. ithere were several horns honking and a few "hey man, move out of the way" comments.
my neighbors couldnt wait to see the display when i was putting it up. i hope they still feel that way. i may have to get some off duty polie or something out there next year because i have a feeling there will be more people than this year.
Bill Hoffman wrote: Sounds like you are heading down that road of stardom, Thyno. lol Get ready for the ride, it may get bumpy!
Bill
i was really concerned a couple of times. i thought a few people would come and see it, but i never imagined it would be like it was. i have to get my dcuks in a row for next year. in the meantime, im going to pull out the leftover christmas stationary and write a letter to each of the residents in my subdivision. there are "only" 100 homes where i live. get it typed up and stick one in everybody's mailbox. something to the effect of not anticipating the crowds and if anybody had any problems to please let me know so i can do some planning to head those things off next year. im proud of my display, but, its still not at the level of the pros on pc. i still think it was too blinky-blink. i cant help but think that if the display drew this kind of response thru word of mouth, that next year it will surely attract tv. the ironic thing is that one of the local tv stations was to come out and feature it, but i had to cancel because of an issue i was having with hardware. thank goodness for small miracles . im going to be monitoring this thread veeeeeeeeeeeeeeery closely.
I too had a lot more traffic than I anticipated. This was my first year, although I have been planning and buying for more than 3 years. I have read this board as a lurker for all of that time until this year. I have "borrowed" many of your ideas and this thread will be the icing on the cake for traffic control. Thank you all!!!!
We entered one city wide lighting contest and we granted one interview for a reporter who wanted to print an article in the paper on Christmas eve morning. Part of my traffic control idea is to never, ever, ever, EVER, do any of that again. I actually had a city police officer sitting on my street to patrol and keep driveways clear on Christmas eve after that article ran on the front page. I even had cars and trucks driving over the sidewalk into the vacant lot next to my house to see the show. Although publicity is flattering, it seems that it could shut you down quicker that you can say "Carson Williams".
I have a 'batch sequence' that repeats every 13 min. This was a good idea for me until Saturday night when I had to cut out two of the musical sequences to keep the traffic flowing. For me (at times) less was more. I think a 50 min. show would be awesome.
Keep the great ideas coming. I can't wait to read some more of your wonderful ideas!
DCook wrote: I too had a lot more traffic than I anticipated. This was my first year, although I have been planning and buying for more than 3 years. I have read this board as a lurker for all of that time until this year. I have "borrowed" many of your ideas and this thread will be the icing on the cake for traffic control. Thank you all!!!!
We entered one city wide lighting contest and we granted one interview for a reporter who wanted to print an article in the paper on Christmas eve morning. Part of my traffic control idea is to never, ever, ever, EVER, do any of that again. I actually had a city police officer sitting on my street to patrol and keep driveways clear on Christmas eve after that article ran on the front page. I even had cars and trucks driving over the sidewalk into the vacant lot next to my house to see the show. Although publicity is flattering, it seems that it could shut you down quicker that you can say "Carson Williams".
With our location near a major street, we get a tremendous amount of traffic (including on foot). We cut down to one song playing continuously and removed our promo spots for the food drive and we still have been averaging 30-45 minute waits and 50-100 cars in line from December 22-27th. Other than running the display in static mode (which isn't really an option with our LOR investment), there isn't much you can do when you live on a cul-de-sac.
I run 4 songs. In between each song is a one minute intermission that talks about my web site and toys for tots. This is when most of the traffic moves. I NEVER run more than 2 songs back to back.
My plan, even though I don't forsee a traffic problem in my area, is sort of a combination of some of the techniques mentioned here. I plan to use the same two commercials, along with a group of songs sort of in the following order...
song 1
song 2
Long commercial (1-2 min, describing set up/display)
song 3
song 4
Short commercial (15-30 sec, "keep it moving, thanks for coming" kind)
song 5
song 6
Long commercial
song 7
song 8
Short commercial
rinse...repeat...
Maybe more songs in total, but probably never more than three songs between commercials. The short commercials would be different, to keep the monotany down, but the long would stay the same. My thinking is that once people here the 'long' commercial repeat, they would think the "show" is repeating, therefore move on.
I've seen a few comments along the lines of "They will think the show is repeating and leave."
They don't! I've had people sit through the same 2-3 songs for 2 or 3 cycles! As for the commercials ... I drive it home every time, don't block the driveway, get out of the road, stay in your car, etc. I don't really care how many times you have heard it, you are going to hear it again. And again, and again.
One of our new members made the observation how the computerized light shows are similar to TV commercials.
At first I wasn't real sure about comparing a one minute TV commercial to a 12 minute computerized light show. The more I thought, the more I realized we're telling a story using light and sound... just like TV. There are some commercials we enjoy watching multiple times. The same applies for our displays. Some people love to see them over and over.
This year (2005) Carson Williams got the perfect combination of light and music which told such a powerful story, people couldn't see it enough. The ironic part is someone made it into a TV commercial.
We're making lifelong memories by telling a unique story. It must be working because of the traffic being generated. We can try and accommodate better traffic flow, but let's be careful not to kill the goose laying the golden egg.
____________________ Chuck Smith at http://www.PlanetChristmas.com
Don't forget our three PlanetChristmas rules: Positive, family friendly and Christmas centric
I had a van full of people sit in front of my house, probably for 30 mins or more, after the show had ended. So it was in complete darkness. Not sure what they were looking at. lol
Bill Hoffman wrote: I had a van full of people sit in front of my house, probably for 30 mins or more, after the show had ended. So it was in complete darkness. Not sure what they were looking at. lol
We had that happen at least once last year, then I realized they were just listening to the Christmas music (still a little strange, since there was nothing to look at and there was Christmas music on other 'real' radio stations). Do you play music after the lights go out? That might be what they were doing.
This year we didn't play music after the show since one of my neighbors pointed out that at least once, someone pulled up in front of her house at 2AM and cranked up the music. Why? I have no idea.
It is kind of ironic when you think about it. We go to all this expense, spend countless hours, spend all year planning, in the workshop for hours on end, and attend PLUS to learn even more about our hobby. Then we try to think of ways to move the viewers on more rapidly so they cannot enjoy the full fruits of our labor. lol
Bill Hoffman wrote: It is kind of ironic when you think about it. We go to all this expense, spend countless hours, spend all year planning, in the workshop for hours on end, and attend PLUS to learn even more about our hobby. Then we try to think of ways to move the viewers on more rapidly so they cannot enjoy the full fruits of our labor.
This is true. It's a fine line we all walk when running these displays.
On the one hand, you have these grand ideas on how you want it to run. Perhaps you have a 12 minute mix of music that tells a wonderful story, and you want everyone to see it.
However, there are considerations that everyone must make. Let's take Jeff Trykoski's house for example. I know of 3 songs he has in rotation, possibly more. If he runs one song a night for a week, there are _still_ going to be people waiting an hour to see it. Now you add to the fact that he has more than one song, and people will want to come back!
I have 10 songs, and run them in 2-3 song shows. For me, this year, it works out well. Traffic does not seem to build up on the road, and people do seem to come back. While Jeff and I live in the same metro area, we are in vastly different parts of it. The area I am in is quietly tucked away in the neighborhood, while Jeff's is near a main road.
(Okay, so I'm rambling ... to the point Don.)
When planning our displays, we should all have two options ready to go. Option One: Traffic is fine. Option Two: You've got Jeff Traffic.
Another thought I've had, and others have had I'm sure ... the longer you do a display, the more popular it becomes .. and more traffic you have each year. There is a real chance you will drive your display right out of business due to the traffic.
