Oops! I suppose all this discussion ought to be placed elsewhere. I just realized how revealing all this might be!

Mystician, I'll PM you.

Why ?? These aren't marketed trade secrets, Bill. This is just specialFX discussion, really. Like talking about pyrotechnics.
There's nothing secretive or magic about tesla coils and the like.

Maybe some are thinking of Miss Electra?

Miss Electra at Knott's Scray Farm last year:



Link to full res. image HERE

Also:
This picture of the entire set up. and check out this guy's site:
http://www.thelightningguy.com/tesla_photos.htm

What about the stuff on this site, like the marx generator: http://www.redremote.co.uk/electricstuff/marxthree.html

or, well, this you ought see for yourself: http://www.electricstuff.co.uk/teslamotor.html

and the Jacob's-ladder-o-phone-o-fire: http://www.electricstuff.co.uk/jacobphone.html (definately a "muahahaha" item)

Drs_Res,

Yes, that's the one.

Psy-Kosh,

Well, now there's an idea...thanks!

Yours,

Paul

Oops!

I guess my idea of price on that, is out of date. I haven't looked at those for a couple of years.

I remember a friend reading a book on Tesla years ago.
Lately I've come to appreciate the fascination.

BTW, Katterfel, you might want to try your original question in the FX forum here at the Café - that'd probably yield some good results from the regulars there.

This may all seem like craziness but this is how creative ideas are born! Very often my partner and I will start off on something which doesn't really work but end up with something entirely different which is a killer effect. Rock on!

Man, I really didn't expect this variety of response to such a simple idea. I would have reposted sooner but my pc died and I am currently posting from my work pc. At any rate, to clarify, what I had in mind was not an actual electrical event. Instead I was looking for the illusion of an electrical effect. Something small and surprising much like the Wizard of Hearts suggested. Still the Pepper's ghost idea got me thinking about holograms and some things I saw in college.
I haven't had a chance to check things out yet( see pc died above ) but I am curious what can be done with small self contained holograms.
Once again guys, thanks much for all the information, especially all the cool stuff on tesla coils.

Harley,

Is Electric Chair/Electric Arc going to be part of any class?

I've been doing a science show for schools called Arcs-N-Sparks for a number of years... Made several T-coils, mostly table top varieties, always had it in my head to fire up my big one at full power... "T'aint the building that's the problem, It's the Gal-Dang..." having the balls to turn it on.

Steve

Personally I don't think the Wizard of Heart's idea will look very good, at least, not without some modification.

To simulate an arc of electricity, which is basically a stream of plasma in the air (that's what you actually see when you see lightning, not the electrons themselves), you have to impart a sense of motion and dynamics to the light.

It can't just be a single flash, you know, "single flash, whoomph, done".
It's got to sustain itself for at least a few hundred milliseconds, and should be flickering for that short duration; for best effect the "arc" should even be multi-pathed, not just a lifeless, unmoving static "fork" or arc between two points.

Without at least the first two conditions satisfied, it just won't impress anyone that you actually have electrical current going. It'll look fake.
There are boxes, however, that are designed to create that short duration, flickering you'd need. Or maybe use multiple FISM flashes.

Somehow I missed this post earlier, but I think mystician hit on a possibility.
A plasma tube can be custom ordered in any size and configuration. A simple straight plasma tube on a pull with a trigger switch would be quite impressive from a distance, combined with a quick spray of antireflective coating on the plasma glass tube, rendering the glass somewhat invisivle from the audience standpoint, and I've seen them in battery operated configurations.
A custom ordered one can't be that expensive if they sell at wal-mart for 20 bucks.

Funny how sometimes powerful TV magic can be.

On a much smaller scale, there's a fun little device which allows you to produce a flash identical to a powerful camera flash, at will, from inside your shirt. combined with a simple vanish it can leave a close-up spectator quite bewildered (and often blinded!). Can't remember its name, but it was around $100, and quite safe. When it was first demo's to me I was quite startled, and I can imagine with the correct staging a spectator would recall a 'huge arc of electricity'.

A Funkenring (sp?)?.....worn up the sleeve
with the part that shoots the sparks directed
outward can produce a "sparks between the fingers"
effect. Coupled with a Fism Flash the effect ought
to be interesting.

I've thought, for a long time, that a floating ball would be very interesting, if it were a plasma ball.

Gameanii, I'd be happy to teach the chair as part of the class.

For any who might not look at other forums, I'll be teaching a classes on sideshow skills and showmanship, June 26-28. PM me for more details.

That sounds like the FISM flash we've been discussing. There's also "Flash Burst", but that's the exact same thing.

Now, there are smaller strobe flash bulbs and circuits, mind you, and I've bought quite a few from Electronic Goldmine.. these are dirt cheap ($1.49 each !! yes !) and look fairly impressive for their size. Perhaps a multitude of these would work.
http://www.goldmine-elec-products.com/pr......r=G15800
(I've shown these to other magicians and gotten very excited responses)

I also like egregor's idea of the custom mfg'd plasma tube.
Now we're getting somewhere !

'Flash burst' was the one I saw.
I'd always thought a FISM-flash was like a Funkenring - you know sparked ignition of flashpaper.
I live 'n' learn...(at a slow rate...)

Many years ago I saw a plasma ball for the first time. They were a really rare novelty then costing about $1000. Now they are around $30 or so.

This is not to be confused with a free-floating ball of plasma like ball lightning. That phenomena is still not understood; some physicists even doubt that it exists.