DregNog Video Advent Calendar: Day #10: O Tesla Tree, O Tesla Tree, How Shocking Are Thy Branches

Fiber-optic Christmas trees are nice and all, but they're so boring. Where's the drama? If your Yule needs a touch of Burning Man, nothing will fix you up faster than a Tesla coil tree -- just check the video. (The sparks start flying around 0:25, for you impatient types who need their plasma-filament-spewing Christmas tree now.)

Of course, this little SSTC tree is pathetic Charlie Brown-esque pipsqueak compared to this Aussie's monstrosity. A Bunbury doctor by day, an "electrickery" wizard in his off-hours, 53-year-old Peter Terren has constructed a 9-foot-tall Tesla Coil tree in his driveway. (Says Terren, "That's how we do it in Oz.") You may remember "Tesla Down Under" from previous electro-stunts such as Terren posing as Rodin's Thinker, if the Thinker were getting zapped by 200,000 volts, and surrounding his car with a lightning force field.

No videos, sorry, but the photos alone will make your hair stand on end:



It should be noted, though, that the tree effect is a trick of long-exposure photography -- for spectators, this holiday spectacle would look like nothing more than, in Terren's words, "sparks jumping in the air." For more, check out Terren's website.