VOA慢速英语2018 昔日拉斯维加斯霓虹灯再次闪耀

Las Vegas, Nevada is a city famous for its exciting nightlife.

内华达州的拉斯维加斯，以热闹的夜生活而闻名。 

One of the main streets is called The Las Vegas Strip.It has many large hotels and casinos, places where people can watch shows when they are not playing games of chance.Nearly all the buildings have bright, neon signs.

这里一有条被称为拉斯维加斯大道的大街。大型酒店和赌场鳞次栉比，人们或观看表演，或赌一场牌局。几乎所有的建筑都闪烁着明亮的霓虹灯。

Now, a new museum will give visitors a chance to see famous neon signs from the earliest days of Las Vegas.

现在，一家新的博物馆让游客们有机会参观拉斯维加斯早期著名的霓虹灯。 

Forty signs from some of the city’s most famous casino-hotels and other businesses are shining once again at the Neon Museum. But their lights are not truly on.

这个霓虹灯博物馆将让这座城市最著名的赌场酒店和其他商店的40个标志再次亮灯。但是这些灯并不是真的亮着。

Over the years, the signs have been worn down by the weather, hot sunshine and desert winds. But a process called projection 1 mapping has been used to bring the signs back to life.Projection mapping creates life-like digital animations 3 of the signs onto the metal.

这些年来，天气、灼热的日光和沙漠吹来的风让这些标志牌褪去了颜色。但是投影映射技术让这些标志牌焕然一新。投影映射将这些标志牌映射到金属上，形成了栩栩如生的数字动画。

Rob McCoy is the president of the Neon Museum.He told the Associated Press “We are combining art, history and technology in this space.This is Las Vegas as it was. It is very emotional.Even people who don’t live here, but live around the United States or around the world, they all have in their heads a romantic image of Las Vegas, and it’s usually that vintage, neon Las Vegas.”

罗伯·麦考伊是霓虹灯博物馆的馆长。他对美联社说:“我们将艺术、历史和技术结合在一起。还原拉斯维加斯昔日景象。这唤醒了人们的内心情感。即使是那些不住在这里的人，他们生活在美国或世界各地，他们脑海中都有一个浪漫的拉斯维加斯形象，那通常就是拉斯维加斯的老式霓虹灯。”

The new museum has the signs of the Golden Nugget, Lady Luck, and Binion’s Horseshoe.

新博物馆陈列着金砖酒店、幸运女神和宾尼恩马蹄铁赌场的标志牌。 

The museum presents a special 30-minute long show after sunset.Visitors are permitted to walk freely and get close to the signs.

黄昏时分，博物馆会举行一场30分钟的特别节目。游客可以随便逛逛，与各种标志牌近距离接触。 

Songs like Elvis Presley’s “Night Life,” ″Mr. Sandman” by The Chordettes and Ella Fitzgerald’s “I’m Beginning to See The Light” play as each sign lights up.

灯光亮起来时，歌曲也随之响起，有猫王的《夜生活》、The Chordettes的《Mr. Sandman》和艾拉·菲茨杰拉德的《我开始看到灯光》。

In the United States, neon signs were first used at the 1893 World Fair in Chicago.But no city used the bright tube lights like Las Vegas.Many of the old signs are kept at the museum, but not all of them work.

在美国，1893年的芝加哥世界博览会上首次使用了霓虹灯标志牌。但是没有一个城市像拉斯维加斯那样拥有如此多的霓虹灯。现在博物馆还保存着许多旧标志牌，但并不是所有的灯都能亮。

Visitors can only imagine what the signs looked like 30 or more years ago.Repairing the signs can cost tens of thousands of dollars each.Projection mapping is a less costly 4 process to show what they once looked like lighted up.

现在游客们只能想象这些标志牌30多年前的样子。修复这些标志牌的成本可能高达数万美元。而投影映射则以较低的成本就能恢复标志牌昔日亮灯的景象。

Craig Winslow is the digital artist and designer who helped create the museum’s neon sign exhibit.He used old photographs, video and other information to digitally recreate each sign.He then used a scanning 5 process to set the exact placement of eight projectors 6 to align 7 everything with the light bulbs, rusted 8 metal and tubes of the signs.

克雷格·温斯洛是数码艺术家和设计师，他帮助创建了博物馆的霓虹灯展览。他利用旧照片、视频和其他信息对每一个标志牌进行数字复原。之后他进行了扫描，确定8个放映机的精确位置，让放映机与电灯泡、生锈的金属和灯管的位置相一致。

“There are moments here where there’s no bulb, but I’ve created a digital bulb that is in its place,” Winslow said.“From far away it just looks like the sign is lit.You get up closer, and you realize all these are broken or there are missing bulbs or hanging bulbs.”

“有时候没有灯泡，但我在那个位置设计了一个数码灯泡，”温斯洛说。“从远处看，就像标志牌被点亮了。你越靠近，你就会发现所有的东西是坏的，或者少了灯泡或者是挂着的灯泡。”

Historical video of the city will be projected onto the signs as well.Some of the video shows the famous performer Liberace playing the piano and gamblers playing table games.

这个城市的历史影像也将被投射到标牌上。其中一些影像展示了著名钢琴家列勃拉斯弹钢琴和赌博者在赌桌上玩牌的情形。

Words in This Story

align – v. to organize things so that they form a line or are in the right position

casino – n. a building or room that has games of chance, such as roulette or blackjack

neon – n. a colorless gas

museum – n. a building where interesting and sometimes valuable objects are collected and shown to the public

illuminated 9 – adj. lit by bright lights

vintage – adj. used to describe something that is not new but that is valued because of its good condition or design

digital animation 2 – n. a process for creating moving images