If an airplane happens by that laser pointer could send you to jail. I wouldn't suggest pointing it "up"
990Brogan, I share your pain. I have a 75W short-arc light which cost me a lot, and still does not put a spot on a cloud (unless you include fog). I have HIDs and LEDs with aspherics, and none got even close. I even bought a plasma light from Luxim, then discovered that it cannot be pointed above 90 degrees (ie upwards towards the sky).
If I had to start all over again with this quest, I would buy a cheap 2KW arc light from aliexpress. Those monsters cost less than $1000, and will probably put a spot on a cloud before catching fire or blowing up.
Thx for those... yes, it seems barely a week goes past without a report of some idiot shining a laser at an aircraft :green: ... Maybe we ought to have a thread in the Lasers section with a list of reports of such incidents.
Thx for those... yes, it seems barely a week goes past without a report of some idiot shining a laser at an aircraft :green: ... Maybe we ought to have a thread in the Lasers section with a list of reports of such incidents.
It's just mentioned here as a friendly bit of advice to enthusiasts of cloud bounce lighting, that they need to be reasonably careful. It's not intended to warn people off responsible use, or good beamshots of long-throw lights, such as that good pic from 2100 in post #9 above.
My question is if you are trying to light up a cloud with a regular non- laser light and your beam shines on a chopper or aircraft, can you get into trouble?
If they report it, yes; a police chopper will probably tell you not to do it discontentedly through its PA (I've actually heard this conversation before, not because of me, a couple blocks away; "GET THAT FLASHLIGHT OUT OF MY FACE"). You have to bear in mind that our big gun lights are very unconventional devices to own, a pilot isn't expecting to see anything brighter than an area security light while he's flying at night..
The pilot should have used his Nightsun searchlight (focused to a narrow beam) to get the point across.