Mod Night! Halloween Style

Having a Mod Night tonight just shy of our next Lazer Tag game.  There's a couple of things that have needed to be done that we finally have the time to get to!  First and foremost, we've got some more lenses from LazerBait to test out.  You'll recall these long-range lenses that have been reaching out and tagging even our best players thanks to the immense range and accuracy of these custom-built lens arrangements.

The nice part about it is that, because they're all built from the same size piping, swapping out different lenses is actually quite easy.  Once you've made the adapter for the back portion of the lens, you can remove the tube and lens off the front and swap in a different one.  Different magnifications on the glass lenses that LazerBait uses denote how each arrangement is essentially "tuned".

With Laser Tag, it's all about how that IR Light is being focused.  You can focus a beam to be incredibly tight for long range but need incredible accuracy to land your shots.  On the flip side, having them slightly out of focus, or creating a "halo" effect with a strong center beam with a bit of a spread around it will work well for most kinds of general combat.  Pinpoint accuracy and deadly range only work for a little while.  And, considering that a stock laser tag blaster has a 500-600 ft range, it's tough to find a line-of-sight shot that exceeds that, decreasing your area of usable distance.

These lenses are all tuned differently, as we've found in range tests and actual in-game use.  The two links below show different lens focus types as well as the results of one of our nighttime range tests.  Both posts show videos displaying the kinds of effect focusing light can have.
Long Range Lens Testing
LazerBait LTX Lenses

We'll also be doing some aesthetic stuff to blasters in preparation for the Halloween Game.  I know one of my buddies is going as Jayne from Firefly... which probably means some kind of "Vera" is in the works.  I'll also be working on my Ghostbusters Costume and hopefully making some kinda blaster for that with a link to a makeshift Proton Pack.  I'm not sure what others are going as, so matching costume blasters for them may not be as important.  We'll see what we get for the Mod Night tonight!