Planet Christmas

1. We’ve made it too complicated!

   Remember chaser strings from long ago?  Wrap one of those around your Christmas tree and suddenly it had personality.  The string had a controller at the end about the size of a matchbox.  Press a button to pick a pattern and you were done programming the computer. Drive around now and some of the over-the-top …

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2. PlanetChristmas is back in 2023!

   Here’s a short video (just over a minute) that shows the highlights of PlanetChristmas 2023. The last major light display at the PlanetChristmas world headquarters in Franklin, Tennessee was way back in 2003.  LEDs and digital pixels were science fiction.  Watching the electric meter spin like a top when all the outside Christmas lights were …

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3. A Better/Cheaper RGB Pixel Matrix Solution?

   I’ve been thinking about adding some sort of pixel matrix to my Christmas display so I could do more messages, graphics and video.  A P10 RGB panel display or pixel mesh solution was going to run a minimum of $600 plus a lot of labor but I would have a low resolution RGB panel prop …

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4. Thinking about RGB pixels?

   Back in the old days you would plug in a string of Christmas lights and they would just turn on.  Easy. Technology started getting involved about a decade ago. Think about a special string of Christmas lights where any light could be any color at any time. The concept has evolved quite a bit and …

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5. Make your own wireframe for the yard

   Ready to create your own wireframes to continue the theme you have evolving in your Christmas display?  You can always go to a local welding shop but it gets expensive in a hurry. Bergmann Lights has a series of videos to help you wrap your head around building your own wireframes from 1/4 inch steel …

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6. How to fix a blow mold?

   Does your Christmas blow mold need some tender-loving care?  John Yanik created an excellent video to guide you through the process.  Check it out! Standby while we load this from YouTube…

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7. How do they make Christmas lights?

   So, how does the factory make a string of Christmas Lights?  It really helps to have a specialized machine and a lot of automation.  This YouTube video is a bit dated and mixes incandescent with LED lights but it does a good job of showing how automation works.  It also shows the difference between lights …

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8. Holiday Lights at Cheekwood Trains 2022

   What happens when you mix a giant model trains layout with Christmas lights dancing to the music?  You end up with Holiday Lights down at the TRAINS! display at Cheekwood Estate and Gardens in Nashville, Tennessee.  The outdoor layout has over 1000 feet of track running eight trains.  See more at http://cheekwood.org/trains. PlanetChristmas helped with …

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9. 2022 Top 10 Christmas tunes list

   At PlanetChristmas we get to see a lot of Christmas displays. We also talk to music producers, programmers and radio DJs about what they think will be hot come Christmas time. This is tough because people love the old traditional tunes when it comes to Christmas but we’re going to give it our best shot. …

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10. Be a good Santa

    I had the pleasure of attending the “Celebrate Santa” convention back in March of this year. There were about 400 portly gentlemen attending to trade secrets on how to be a better Santa. I took all the knowledge collected at this gathering, mixed it with my own and have come up with ten tips on …

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