Creating Smoke

[actorgeek]

I'm currently working on a short one-act Shakespeare revue type play meant for tours and performances in non theater settings. As part of the Macbeth Witches scene I would like to create smoke. I am trying to find a smoke bomb type contraption that would let off a fairly good amount of smoke quickly and without any bulky machine or electricity. We can't use flame of any kinds since this will be taken into school gyms and hotel ballrooms. Any ideas? Does something like this exist for the theater?

Thanks in advance,
Matt

 

[cprted]

You can get small, battery powered smoke machines that produce a decent effect. I'm sure someone can recommend a specific make/model for you.

 

[gafftaper]

If you want a true professional quality chemical fogger then you have three options from Look Solutions. This is how the pros do it, but they are not cheap at $1700-$1850. It looks like Antari makes a portable called the M1 for about $700 but oddly it isn't listed on their website. Perhaps it's discontinued. Antari makes decent sort of high end DJ quality equipment. Not the best but not the worst either. That's it for anything you can call reliable.

There may be an option out there in the Chinese/party/Halloween market as well.

I have the feeling you are doing this on a shoestring budget and you choked when I said $1800 for a fog machine. So create your own dry ice device! Go buy a pound of dry ice and experiment with it. You've got lots of room to work with in a cauldron. Just rig up your own basket of dry ice that get's dropped into a bowl of hot water. You'll be amazed how much you can do for very little.