Design Elements

Snow Machines

In light of a certain wintery holiday approaching I thought I’d mention a cool piece of technology some people might not be aware of. That is the (fake) snow machine. For those of us northernly challenged (living in Texas as I do)…we usually have to fake our winter wonderlands.

Enter the snow machine. Essentially…the typical snow machine used a foamy solution to make tiny foam bubbles that can look like snow. Then a fan blows the “snow” unidirectionally and it floats down like snow. You can either buy one for anywhere from $60-250…or you can often rent them from local companies that rent out DJ gear.

A few tips if you plan to use a snow machine this year:

  • The fans are very loud. If you’re in a small auditorium setting…be sure that something loud is happening if you’re using the snow machines inside.
  • Test the things before you use them. Some snow machines don’t work well if they aren’t flat.
  • The foam it produces can become a bit slippery if it falls on a very smooth surface.

A quick story. We used two snow machines one year…but hadn’t tested them. We put them tilted up on the stage behind some dancers. During the peak of the song we flipped them on…trying to create a really cool atmosphere. The sound of the fans actually drowned out the accompanying track…and since we had the snow machines tilted up…globs of foam shot out instead of a soft snow fall. Pretty lame.

So…have you used a snow machine before? What brand have you used? Also…what horror stories do you have from using snow machines that might help others?

Church Plant...More Like Church Tree Box it Up to Go

5 responses to “Snow Machines”

  1. Colt Sammons says:

    Antari is a huge special effects company that makes a pretty wide variety of products. I have used many snow machines and the biggest problem is always "sound". These things are louder than you think! So below I did some research and I found that Antari produces what they call a quiet snow machine (Antari S200) Attached is what Google shopping had for best price with free shipping. I highly recommend buying it, I mean when you total up your rental fee, gas and time to go get these for renting you should own it.So for a product that is only 600.00 it puts out a pretty large volume. And who doesnt want snow year round?I live in Bradenton, Florida and as soon as I get to work today i am pulling ours out of the closet to get rid of this heat!
    Hope this helps.
    http://www.pssl.com/!YISHjiovAIst6cqlISKrDQ!/Anta

  2. Karl Huber says:

    Used 3 last year over the house for Christmas. We knew they were going to be loud, but it kind of worked for us. The first place we used them was the opener. The lights went all the way out. When the snow started everyone kind of wondered what was going on with that noise. The band started building the first song and about 20 seconds in, we had some movers come on scanning the crowd and every time they all ooo'd and ahhh'd. Then we used them for the final. We rented them and I actually had to repair the tubing in two of them because they were dry rotted. Make sure you run warm water through them for a minute or so after EVERY use. That will help reduce any snow realted issues. Great effect if it is not over used.

  3. Danny Isom says:

    We rent 10 "Snowboys" every year from Snow Business Hollywood and run them in all 4 of our Christmas Eve services. They are really loud like was mentioned above, but we strategically start and stop them at loud and quiet parts (respectively) of "O Holy Night" … you can see a video here – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMQ2mXauvXY the snow starts around :54. It has become a great outreach tool for people to invite friends to church on Christmas Eve because where else are you guaranteed snow in Austin Texas?

  4. sharleen says:

    Hi I will like to buy a machine please contact me thanks 0846559542

Leave a Reply to Danny Isom Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.