Colton Johnson from Lemont Calvary Church in Lemont, IL brings us this mixture of twigs, stretch fabric, and light bulbs.
Materials:
- Several dozen branches and small trees
- 1 gallon of white parking lot paint
- Several spray cans of white paint
- 10 hanging bulbs
- 2 spandex rectangles
- 2 LED 1-meter bar lights
- 4 LED par can lights
- 4 large containers filled with sand (to hold large branches)
They painted the larger limbs and trees with white parking lot paint. It’s significantly thicker than normal exterior/interior paints, so it holds nicely to the bark and absorbs well. It’s also more affordable than most latex.
They spray painted the smaller branches. Then they spray-painted some large containers (pulled from a dumpster) black and filled them with sand to hold the large limbs up. They purchased the sand from a local quarry.
They needed much more sand than they anticipated, 590 lbs to be exact. That’s about a half a bed of a normal sized pickup truck. This would cost a small fortune if purchased in bags from a hardware store, but from a quarry it cost them $3.94. A concrete plant also quoted them about the same price.
The hanging bulbs were simply 9ft extension cords, with bulb sockets and 7-watt refrigerator bulbs. The cords cost them $1.25, the sockets were $.79, and the bulbs ran $.89 each. The cheapest comparable hanging socket Colton could find online was around $6 and did not include a bulb. The bulbs, in person, have a very dim-retro appearance but are several dollars cheaper than filament bulbs.
Not including stage lights and spandex, they spent about $90.
How did they hang the spandex and where did they get it from?