Are they a blast for gigs or are they just messy? Do they make floors slippery? I don't want to get one if people are going to slip etc. Seriuosly, granny at a wedding slips breaks her hip I would lose my shirt. I doubt insruance would cover that. So..do they make a floor slippery? Do people loose their minds if they get a bubble in the eye etc? I'm asking this before I even consider bringing it up to a club owner etc..well for the above mentioned reasons. So any experience out there I'm asking for advice. Thanks Much

Sgtdude

Get insurance. Period. Liability and comprehensive. If granny breaks her hip, that's what it's for. I had a bad run-in with a show where the "comprehesive theft" didn't cover "comprehensive or theft" and if you want the name of those jerks, I'll gladly provide it. I got $10K worth of gear stolen and they said "nope, the insurance doesn't cover that".

Bubble machines:
I took my wife and kids to Disney on Ice over the weekend. Extensive use of bubble machines on two segments. Of course, it's hitting ice, and I'm not gonna be stepping on it, so it's not a big deal.

In my experience with bubble machines, unless you're using a really crappy solution that is drippy, they don't really tend to be a problem. The bubbles do tend to be rather "dry" but do last long enough to get the effect across. What I find annoying is getting the bubbles on my glasses because I'm just stupidly anal about my glasses being dirty. Detest it!

The bottom line is that if you use an approved formula or a pre-packaged solution, its not really all that messy. Most of the mess tends to be around the unit itself, but I don't see that happen too often either. And when it does happen, it's usually due to sloppy filling. Maybe raise it off the floor a bit too seems to help. If you've got some air circulation, it also helps.

I find people get more bothered by fog machines than bubble machines.

In your case, I'd have the club owner bring it up with their attorney to see about liability, medical and comprehensive concerns. But if you're the mobile dude bringing it in, they'll sue the club, which in turn will sue you, unless the "victim" goes right after you.

I've been debating on buying a bubble machine, but my business doesn't need it right now. I think you'd be safe.

I fully agree about the insurance. Btw I'm a mobile dude and wear glasses and am with you about when they get dirty. I'm considering buying a bubble machine because it seems the "ravers", high schools and weddings parties really like them. So I guess bottom line is the quality of the solution. Good solution=happy bride. Cheap solution= broken hips + angry bride and one sued DJ. That about right?

Sgtdude

What we do is almost always about customer service.

I do concerts and live bands mainly, so my application is different than DJ's. I'v found it impossible to make brides happy. All they want is cheap. Imagine spending $2-3K on a cake that tastes like sawdust, $1500 for "toiletpaper-looking" streamers, and they don't want to spend a dime on sound/entertainment, and even if they agree and contract, they still whine and complain. Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm sorry it wasn't ringing with feedback. I'm sorry the sound was clean and clear. I'm sorry I had all the required music put onto CD to make it easy to ensure you got your special stuff played when it was needed. I'm sorry I brought pro gear. I'm sorry I spent 3 hours setting up and 2-3 hours striking. I'm sorry I brought an actual light show. What I should be saying is "I'm sorry you didn't pay me then $3200 that you SHOULD have paid for services instead of charging you $700 for the night". But, that's a Sacramento California thing. I think I get the "Bridezilla" clients.

I had to take a potty break(no break since 11AM and here it was 8PM and I didn't get a food break yet either) and some dullard decided my rig was free for them to use and starting "taking over". Well, thank goodness my contract has a "shut down clause" in it: my gear, my control. Any violation = immediate shut down. But that was a particularly trashy group.

I don't get complaints from bands or concert promoters, or concert goers. I don't get problems either.

What we do is customer service. We do what we do to make the client happy. While they don't directly dictate what we MUST bring or use, we use our best judgement. We make buy decisions based on what we think we can use to in turn help us make that money back and then some.

Some people say the bubble machine is cheesy. Some people say fog machines are cheesy. Properly used, you know, I really can't see a prblem with either. I think they are great tools to have. I think the fog machine is more critical than a bubble machine. But, I think bubble machines are cool too. For me, I'm off of fog and moving to a hazer as I don't like that puff of fog, would prefer a thinner continuous effect that haze offers, and use fog more for the effect of a fog/smoke blast.

I think it's not just the solution for bubbles. I do agree that it must be the startting point. I would think that a cheap bubble machine could also contribute to problems. It could leak, fling stuff around, or otherwise get messy for no reason.

For me, fog machines and haze are out. I need whatever power I can get for my sound gear, backline, monitors and lighting, and I can't afford to burn the power that a fog machine is going to need. I just don't get the circuits available. Bubble machines can't possibly have the same current draw as a hazer. Hazers tend to draw less than fog machines. Fog machines just waste a lot of energy, but that's the nature of the beast. But, bubble machines aren't gonna let you "see the beams" either.

If it seems a bubble machine will help make an event better, what a cheap investment that can be used over and over again.

Sorry to hear about that gig Chris but just by hearing that I'm going to admend my contracts to include a shut down clause. So far I haven't had a bridzilla though they're out there. I hear you on the they spend the bucks on everything except the entertainment. The power issue is exactly why I went Led. For the largest gigs I run a 1200w system and 10 led intelligent lights with a fog machine. So far I haven't had any power requirement issues but i don't expect any either. Now that I said that murphy's law will kick in lol

With each of my main amps(check the web site, it will make sense), they each want 20 amps. But most weddings, I can go "half" and can safely put 2 on a single 15 and still cover large weddings(500+ drunken partiers). That's a circuit.

FOH needs a circuit. I'm drawing 13.5 amps.

Backline and monitors needs a circuit. That's 15 amps gone and that's got some left-over, but how much varies according to the band.

Then I gotta find another circuit for lights. Fog? That sucks away 700 watts, I can't spare that. LED is the natural choice. Sure does cost. But, sure is worth it. The cost is TOTALLY justified.

What does a bubble machine pull? A small durable motor and some sort of fan? It has to be relatively speaking, low draw. Plus, seeing the lights play through bubbles is kind of fun too. Couple that with a hazer for the beams, and that's good. What you should add is cheap sampler like a Roland MS-1(easy to use, can work off batteries if need be!). Put in a few fun sounds in there. When you trigger the bubble machine, hit a "bubble" sound! Bury it down so it's not so obvious.

I also have a "no outside music" clause without prior arrangements. Due to the high resolution of my system, you'd hear ALL the crap that happens to music via the MP3 process. Since most of my clients love to steal music, they put their crappy sounding MP3(quality doesn't matter to them) onto a red-book CD-R. I won't play their stuff at events. They usually say "Can you play this?" and I say "yes" and then put it aside, never to be touched. When they get all snotty and question me about it, I said I answered the question correctly. Could I? Sure, I could. The real question is "Will I?", and that answer is "no". As I cater mainly to bands anyways, I don't have too many more of these problems.

Fog is a power pig, wasting a lot of power, especially when not used. Haze costs more, is thinner, draws less, but gives you beams when the lights hit it. Trade-off is it runs all night. People that are bothered by fog are not bothered by haze because they are less aware of it. Bubbles? Bubbles work with or without fog or haze or even lights. Fog and haze is silly without lights. Haze needs lights to really make sense. Fog can be used by itself for effect. Couple that a step further with a device like Mr. Kool, and ou have another fog effect that can work by itself and doesn't necessarily need lights because of the effect.

With so many choices, why not offer a new bubble machine/fog machine that produces cool fog that is blown into bubbles for "smoky bubbles". Might be a neat hybrid. Definately a good choice for scented fog juice. They make flavored solutions for bubble machines(to entertain dogs for exampe). Any wanna-be DJ chefs want to mix and match?

I've been to events where they get there and one of the first things they do is get their hazers going to ensure that room is sufficiently full of haze befor the show begins. This is before even setting the stage or focussing lights, that early. If they also use fog, that seems to wait a while. Bubble machines seem to go in later still, not as an after-thought but because they don't need the same amount of preparation time. And your clients are requesting it. Seems your business decision is, like mine, highly client driven. And you're listening.

Man, if more would be like you, it would be great. But you've been at this a while, so i makes sense.

I have to make a decision of this nature soon. I'm probably looking at an Antares hazer, as long as it uses water-based haze solution. Always go water-based, it won't gunk up gear internals like mineral-based solutions do. Bubble machines don't have this problem.

I use water based solutions for the same reasons. I made the mistake of loaning a school my old machine and they had left it filled with the old type solutions for a few days and hadn't cleaned it. When I got the machine back it was too late. The smoke filled bubbles would be cool and is again very viable. It reminded me of the old guy blowing cigarette smoke through a bubble maker. A small hose run up behind the plastic loop at a very slow rate should work.

The friendly person saying "can you play this"...That's one of the reasons why I went SDJ1 from American Audio it only uses SD flash cards. But that put me in a bad spot to. Here in Canada if you copy music to a hard drive device you have to have a AVLA license for it. The whole AVLA thing is if your going to copy any CDs etc. So I sub to a commercial music group. I could have gone with a real Harddrive system but I wanted to move away from systems with any moving parts ie SDJ1 or SDJ2. It boils down to $500-$600 for CDs (got to buy the tunes anyways) then another $380 for AVLA per year. But thinking about it though I would be scared to play some guys burned CD anyways because of what the rocket scientist may have on it. Virus etc. Even Sony got busted for having an embbeded trojan on their CDs.

Loved the digital sampler you talked about. I watch a Russian kid on you tube going crazy with it. Something like that would be a really good addition. I'd probably go with Virtual DJ software for my laptop (used for back up). I try to have back up for everything..sound lights etc. Murphy's Law again.

I didn't hear about Sony embedding a trojan on a CD. Ewww.

Once a year, one of my brothers-in-law borrows a fog machine of mine for this party thrown at one of his friend's house. I always top it off for him. An ADJ FogStorm 700 with the wireless remote. If it wasn't for that once a year usage, I would have no idea of the condition of my fog machine.

At their last party, they borrowed some other lights as well. If I got a bubble machine, I'd probably let them use that for a trial.

I agree with trying to stay away from moving parts in your media. I have a friend who did some recording session with a pro quality mobile unit but I think it was some sort of hard drive based technology, and when he moved the unit, I think it took an accidental bounce and hosed the saved session. The rest of the details, such as on/off at the time, I forget. I think he was running a DAT for back-up. He ended up getting through things just fine.

Yeah, that MS-1 sampler is cheap, doesn't do a whole lot, but has been a nice cheap subsitute for a vastly more expensive solution for the groups I work with.

Back-up is critital. When ever it can be afforded, it's essential. When I do shows, the truck is full. I pull what I need, leave the rest. If I need it, it's in the truck or in the venue with me.

The laws here in the US are different. Anyone with a bunch of stolen music(typical) is suddenly a DJ. ADJ can't control that, nobody buy the "DJ"'s lack of skills can control that.

Now I want a Mister Kool and a bubble machine plus an Elation DMX splitter/distro. More wireless mics, an X48, wireless antenna distros.... ugh, sucks to spend big bucks so often! But at least I buy good gear and it lasts.