Hehe, cool picture! Though I see what it is!

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If you mistake a way, then I spot to mean it that do.

Thanks! And what do you think it is?

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I said I KNOW what it is! It's one of those plasma-lamps, that shoots out lightning-bolts. We have one, I'm looking at it right now!

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If you mistake a way, then I spot to mean it that do.

Well, if you have one, too... you are right, its a plasma lamp. But because I can regulate the power supply its on a very low level, so it just emittes a few thin beams of plasma. I thought i would get away with it...
I experimented a bit with the camera and its manual settings (timing and apperture) on very dim objects, without using a flash. Well, that wouldnt help much on the plasma beams anyway... This pic was made at F16/2secs or so, with a tripod of course.
BTW, I have 2 of those lamps...

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Visit me at BOINC Synergy Team: [link]
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It doesn't matter that I figured out how you did it, it was still an awesome picture. And I love those plasma lamps. I want a more expensive model, the one we've got is a cheap one. It has only two settings: On, and voice activated. The voice activation is fun, for about 5 minutes, when you get flashes of lightning if you make a noise at the lamp.

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If you mistake a way, then I spot to mean it that do.

Yeah, the plasma lamps look pretty cool... The model I have was quiet cheap too, although its big (25cm globe) it only was 20€ or so. I got 2 because I put them on a wall, left and right of a window. The weird thing is that they dont make the same kind of beams. I had a look at them, and they are identical down to the last screw - yet one behaves differently to the other.
The have a sound activated mode as well, but it doesnt work so well. It needs a very loud noise or a knock on the base to trigger it. And I find it a bit enerving when it flickers anyway...

BTW, did you see the electric sheep picture I submitted? Its from a screen saver that really is a distributed computing project to generate art. Very cool stuff, but demanding on hardware and connection. It generates some far out fractal art after a while, and I´d like to upload some, even if a still shot is not as spectacular as when its moving.
Problem is - its a screen saver, and I dont know how to make a screenshot. It cant run in another mode, so as soon as I trigger a screenshot it stops and disappears. Any ideas on that?

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Visit me at BOINC Synergy Team: [link]
or in the music community of Last.fm: [link]
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Plasma lamps are cool, yeah! My brother has one shaped like a bottle, we've had some fun experiments with that one!

As for screenshots, do you have Photoshop? If you do, all you need to do is activate the screensaver, and when you see an image you like, hit the Print Screen-button (don't know if it has another name on German keyboards, but hopefully you know what button it is anyway). This stores the current screen (everything on your monitor at the time you hit Print Screen) in the buffer. Now you can start Photoshop, as soon as it is up and running, hit Ctrl+N and press OK. Now press Ctrl+V (or go to Edit>Copy) and your captured image will appear as a new layer. Hope that works, let me know if you have any problems.

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If you mistake a way, then I spot to mean it that do.

Thanks for the tip! It works ok using the clipboard. Only its a little clumsy, as each single pic needs seperate treatment. I tried screenshot programs, they save shots automatically - but they dont work with a screensaver.

Do you know the electric sheep project? Its quiet cool, but it needs a DSL connection with flatrate, it up- and downloads lots of data all the time. But it makes great graphics, after running for a few days.
The name comes from the SF novel "Do Androids dream of electric sheep?" by Philip K Dick, may be you have read it? I didnt... perhaps if I find it somewhere I might.

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Visit me at BOINC Synergy Team: [link]
or in the music community of Last.fm: [link]
or the Euro bill tracking community: [link]

Yeah, my method will only save one screenshot at a time. I dunno any other methods or programs that will allow shots of screensavers, though I'm pretty sure there are some available.

I didn't know about the Electric sheep project, no... But of course I know and have read the book (and seen the movie, of course!). Dick is one on my (many) favourite authors.

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If you mistake a way, then I spot to mean it that do.

Well, its ok for now - I dont need that many of those screen shots.
Thank for pointing out the typo! I just copied it when I submitted another pic. Isnt it strange - in a text you have written yourself you dont see a typo sometimes, even if you read it 3x. Weird...

There is a movie from this book, too? Whats it called? Unlikely that I havent seen it... unless it new - or really bad.

--
Visit me at BOINC Synergy Team: [link]
or in the music community of Last.fm: [link]
or the Euro bill tracking community: [link]