Ghost Shoes

Ghost shoes are the more ethereal version of the shoes that get tossed onto telephone wires. These are solar-powered and so they charge every day to glow every night.

Dedicated to Paul.

Step 1 Hack up a garden light

I bought six garden lights for $10 and proceeded to chop them down to the bare essentials. All I wanted was the solar panel, the circuitry, and the battery. The LED is going to get tossed so don't worry about how bright it is at first.

Comments

[magdalene74]

Makes sense.. most drug buys are made at night afterall.. LOL j/k this looks like a lot of fun.. still, i gotta wonder if this group leader or teacher knew what MOST hanging shoes are all about.

[tribotig]

What are most hanging shoes about?

[tribotig]

Just great! Love them.

[pokiespout]

Excellent idea! I live in a neighborhood full of drug houses with many dangling shoes, this will be a terrific addition and will surely cause the dealers to do a fair amount of head scratching!

[magdalene74]

heh, my first thought when i saw these was "um... hanging shoes around here means drug house... not sure i want a bunch of stoners knocking on my door..." then i see these comments and seriously laughed so hard i snorted LOL. My kids, they are homeschooled so a bit on the naive side, when they were younger wanted to throw their old tennis shoes over the wires... i had a delicate time trying to explain why that wasnt such a good idea LOL, i went with "well, its not quite legal hon, those people are breaking the rules, you dont want to break the rules do you? ::downtrodden look:: "i guess not..." LOL. Still i can think of all sorts of ways to use this instructable, especially with halloween coming up and yard lights going on sale...Good job!!

[orangesrhyme]

Or they'll break into your house looking for glowing 'shrooms.

[pokiespout]

Ah, they do that anyway.

[orangesrhyme]

Tee hee. That one made milk come out my nose.

[Zovits]

Erm, I do not want to spoil anyone's fun, but is it legal and/or safe to toss self-made objects at vital infrastructure elements?
Just like LED Throwies, they were (and actually are) pretty cool, but authorities said no-no to throwing them at things you don't own.

[fungus amungus]

It's a lot safer than throwing real pairs of shoes which are waaay heavier than these.

[mynameisjonas]

very cool! this reminds me of the work of Mark Jenkins, he did street art using a similar method

[phreec]

wow... i wouldn't want to be the giraffe he wrapped in saran...

[fungus amungus]

Mark's work is great! His stuff certainly inspired this project.

[Bloonie]

Love your ghost shoes! I made them for our 2 night time Christmas parades (one pair each to hang on each outside mirror of our car) that we (cloggers) were in. I used 'Q-Branch' Throwies minus the magnets in them instead of solar. Our group loved them and wanted to take them home with them. I keep them, but after the parades were over I added taps on the bottom of the shoes so they looked like clogging shoes and gave them away as Christmas presents to our director and and one clogger who was real sick and miss that one parade. Then made a pair for me. They looked great on my Christmas Tree. I am going to make small ghost clogging shoes for all the cloggers for next Christmas. Small one will look super on the tree. Thank again for a great idea.

[fungus amungus]

Glad they helped to deck out your car and you ahd fun. Just one question: what do you mean by "cloggers"?

[Bloonie]

Clogging is an American folk dance that is similar to tap dancing. It is making rhythmic tapping sounds with the feet. Special shoes are used to emphasize the tapping sounds. These usually are soft leather shoes with hard soles and attached metal taps.

Clogging is influenced by many of the European dance forms, as well as Canadian step dancing and breakdancing. It is done to almost any kind of upbeat music. Country and traditional bluegrass music are the most popular, but cloggers today also dance to pop, rap, hip-hop, anything with a fast beat. Copied from Kelli McChesney website.

Our group is 50years and older and exhibition for local charities. Below is a link from Clogbuzz.com which as a video clip from America's Best dance Crew with 'Dynamic Edition'(young cloggers) dancing. Lots of fun if you love to dance.

http://www.clogbuzz.com/abdc4dance.html

[alex-sharetskiy]

Very cool!!!

[Mercat]

It would be cool to do a tape-cast of a person and put it up in your front yard for Halloween... If I weren't afraid it would get destroyed by drunken frat kids (ah college life) I would totally try it. =)

[DELETED_lsloan]

(removed by author or community request)

[fungus amungus]

Thanks. It's one of those projects that's not immediately apparent at all. Seeing it in place, though, it makes perfect sense.

[LuminousObject]

This is awesome. If only I didn't throw away those garden lights.

[taco_guy93]

NEVER throw away garden lights! those things have so many uses it unimaginable!

[rickyd!]

too bad their not good for anything else

[taco_guy93]

yeah! it seems no these days you never use things for their actual purpose. i'd never use garden lights as garden lights but instead as a self sufficient humanoid drone bot

[LuminousObject]

Its so much more fun to use things for your purposes instead of the purpose they were meant for. And I found that I still, have one light left.

[taco_guy93]

use that remaining light! for purposes other than what it was made for! 'o' self sufficient humanoid drone bot

[taco_guy93]

WHAT!!! no script! that blows <--- thats supposed to be small if i could make it that way!

[LuminousObject]

I know. Now I'm mad at myself.

[lawizeg]

Actually, the shoes that hang from wires mean that drugs are sold in the area. Depending on the color of the shoes, that's the type of drug. Cool i'ble though! I like it.

[blugyblug]

Serious? I always thought that some bully took it from a kid and threw them up on the power lines so the kid wouldnt be able to get his shoes back.

[shadow12952]

lol this must mean something new

[fungus amungus]

People throw them up for all sorts of reasons. One of the many explanations is that they are the shoes of someone who has passed away.

[techiebot]

I have read many theories about why people throw shoes up on telephone lines. What is even more interesting is why people throw hundreds of pairs up in trees!!! I can only imagine a tree filled with ghost shoes on a spooky, windy night.

[Lynne Bruning]

I've left pink cowboy boots swining from the tree off Route 50. I should make some glow boots for next years drive by!

[professorred]

or lost a foot race

[LinuxH4x0r]

Awesome!

[whatsisface]

Woah, that's a really neat idea. I'm going to have to try this.

[marc92]

It might be cool to incorporate LED's into the actual tape cast of the shoes.

[indeepknit]

These are ghoulishly fantastic. I would hang these from my trees.

[bumpus]

I love doing this with my shoes!!! Very good -ible Fungus!!