The Energy Efficient Holiday Light Spectacular: About the artist



Josh McCormick
Josh McCormick is an aspiring technology artist, and the person behind the energy efficient holiday light display. He currently works for a Fortune 100 company as a Senior Infrastructure Specialist. In his spare time, he enjoys pursuing projects which combine technology with a social message.



2005: The Santa Claus Hack
Last year, Josh McCormick created his art project, the Santa Claus Hack. Armed with an animatronic Santa Claus from Wal*Mart and a knowledge of electronics and micro controllers, he repurposed the Jolly Old Cringle Robot so that it no longer belted out holiday tunes, but gave drunken and mischevious holiday messages for the boys and girls.

But there was a real artistic statement behind the piece... or actually, a question. "Who controls Santa Claus?" Who controls our shared mythology? What limits are their behavior? You can read more about it at the Santa Claus Hack project page.

Sadly, his art project was rejected by a local art show. But his consolation was quick in coming. After documenting his project on the Internet, he instantly received national, even international publicity. His work was quickly seen by a far greater audience of tens of thousands of people worldwide.


2006: The Energy Efficient Holiday Light Spectacular
His 2006 project had several goals. Unlike last year, he wanted to connect with a local audience. He also wanted to make a statement regarding energy. After a bit of research, he found synergy in three pieces of technology that save electricty and add excitement: LED lights, computer control, and a micro-power FM transmitter.

He uses them to create a low power display that rivals more elaborate and energy consuming displays. "Just because you make something energy efficient, it doesn't mean that is has to be a lesser copy of the original. The display actually got more exciting as we added each of the energy saving components."

Josh points out that this isn't the first LED based christmas light display, with one such notable light show being from the Crazy Light Lady, who has almost 50,000 LEDs. But this is the first display to focus specifically on consuming very little power, while still maintaining an exciting display.