LiveSpark's Answer to the Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte

Every Halloween we let loose and have some fun with fire and pumpkins. For this year’s back yard hilarity we invited a couple LA drummer friends, Kevin Katich and Danny Finneran to come by and play on our pumpkin fire drum kit.

The ABC TV show Right This Minute has some nice coverage including behind-the-scenes footage, and this video got picked up on Reddit and even topped the Halloween viral videos list on imgur.

Too much? Nah.

ABC TV show "Right This Minute" shows LiveSpark's viral video from Halloween 2018, a fire pumpkin drum kit, including behind-the-scenes footage of how we made this fun with fire.

It works by piezo drum triggers attached to small pumpkins which send a signal each time the pumpkin senses a hit from a drum stick to an Alessis Trigger IO MIDI interface. These MIDI notes stream into Ableton Live where the LiveSpark Max Plugin converts them to flame commands. From there, the commands arrive at the LiveSpark Controller which pushes them to the FirePixel device array.

In all we used 21 FirePixels and 9 AfterBurners fueled by two 25 gallon propane tanks. In truth we can run for hours and hours on that supply, but to get the really big double AfterBurner poofs only the peak supply from two tanks will do, and we didn’t even use an accumulator.

This isn’t the first time we’ve set drums on fire, either.

Titanium AfterBurners

In a recent project for the Life is Beautiful music festival announcement video, we had the pleasure of installing a dozen FirePixels and four AfterBurners on to an incredibly badass custom-built midi drum kit. The video shoot went great, and afterward it seemed like a good idea to try out a new formulation of titanium particulate we intend to use on a few upcoming projects. This slow-mo video shows the result of our experiment. Enjoy!

This slow-mo captures the LiveSpark team having a bit of fun. We toss a handful of 200-mesh titanium particulate into 4 AfterBurner flames to create a huge bright plume of fire and sparks. In addition to being fun, this effect can be automated via a Twin-AfterBurner setup, where two AfterBurners are mounted on either side of a single FirePixel.

$10,000 Drone Race and the Ring of Fire

When Extreme Drone Circuit racing wanted to create the hottest course ever, they chose Downtown Las Vegas as the location, Zappos as the sponsor, and LiveSpark to bring the fire. The 3-D slalom of neon hoops and tight turns would make even iron-stomached roller coaster fans quiver. But instead of gripping controls in the cockpit, these aerialists sat comfortably off the course, steering virtually, at the helm of their tiny quadcopter drones. Heads-up display 3-D goggles allowed 75 pilots to navigate with death-defying realism, yet survive those hairy crashes into truss, steel, screens, nets, and many other dangerous obstacles throughout the course—and oh there were many terrific crunches throughout the two-day championship.

LiveSpark knew that to match this Tron-like vision of the future, we would have to up our flame game, and so we did. Paying homage to the traditional circus ring of fire, we provided a flaming finish line: one final peril following the turning, climbing twisting dog fight of a race. And yet, conceptually this ring of fire had to be like no other. 

We mounted a dozen FirePixel effects pointed down-course on a 10-foot truss ring like a blazing tunnel of fire: flashing in chases, pulses and blasts of flame just as fast as these nimble drones could zip through the ring. The result? A futuristic flaming ring that brought the already high drama to fever pitch, merged thematically with the race, and brought glowing smiles to the faces of racers and fans alike.

First-person view drone racing

In first-person view drone racing, the racers see what their drones see.

Posted by The Verge on Saturday, January 16, 2016

Tyra Banks Music Video

Whether you just like Tyra Banks for her beauty, or as host of America's Next Top Model, or her music, now you can enjoy her playing with FirePixels. Her music video BOOTYful was filmed at club LiFE at the SLS hotel in Las Vegas and features several scenes in front of the LiveSpark FirePixel wall.

The music video debuted on the CW's show America's Next Top Model episode, "The Girl Who Became BOOTYful," and includes behind the scenes making of the video. The full episode can be viewed on Hulu here: http://www.hulu.com/watch/854411.

Scene from Tyra Banks music video for BOOTYful.

Scene from Tyra Banks music video for BOOTYful.

FirePixels on display at club LiFE during Steve Angello's Reflections residency.