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Timecoding a Rock Show

Timecoding a Rock Show

The world of stage productions has really grown complex in the last 10 to 15 years. Not only have automated lights become standard, but so have digital audio consoles, complex show control systems, motion control and networking. Often these systems must be synchronized via MIDI or SMPTE to ensure a reliable and repeatable production. While it can be amazing to sit back and watch a programmed light show run automatically, it is also a bit disheartening to walk away from a desk and have the show continue.

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Stranger in a Strange Land

Often enough my work takes me abroad. And just when I thought I’d played a gig in every corner of the world, some band has found a new locale.  There was a time when South America seemed like a distant land, an impossible place to do a proper show. But that’s in the past. Now I get to teach the locals how to do shows in lovely places like Ethiopia and Kazakhstan.

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Free Rigging Data Slide Rule Returns

SYRACUSE, NY — For the 20th year,  J. R. Clancy is giving away free slide rules to rigging technology dealers and installers. The newly revised sixth edition of the Clancy Slide Rule is made to be easy-to-use, fit in a shirt pocket, and give riggers a way to quickly calculate ratios and measurements commonly used in rigging.

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July 2008

Clay Paky Alpha 300 Series

Clay Paky has introduced four compact 300-watt moving yoke projectors: Alpha Beam 300, Alpha Spot HPE 300, Alpha Spot 300 and Alpha Wash 300 washlight. Alpha Beam 300 pro-duces a parallel beam, similar to that of an ACL. Alpha Spot HPE 300 features zoom, CMY, 8+1 color wheel, 15 gobos, morphing effect, rotating prism, frost, dimmer on dedicated channel, iris and strobe. Alpha Spot 300 features two 8+1 color wheels, 15 gobos, morphing effect, rotating prism, dimmer on dedicated channel and strobe. Alpha Wash 300 features CMY color mixing and 8+1 color wheel, two levels of frost, dimmer on dedicated channel and strobe.
PRG Distribution • 702.942.4772 • www.prg.com

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Bringing South Pacific to Lincoln Center

When stage manager Michael Brunner worked on South Pacific in summer stock as a younger man, he had no idea that he would one day be tackling it full force at New York’s Lincoln Center. Now the 30-year theatre veteran is the production stage manager (PSM) for the first revival of the classic Rodgers and Hammerstein show in 53 years at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre. And as he has noted — with a production that includes a large cast, prop plane and two real Navy trucks converted for stage use — the larger scale “makes a difference.” Critics and audiences are agreeing, along with celebrities like Robert Redford, Jane Alexander and David Hasselhoff, all of whom have come to check out the show.

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The Cure – 4 Tour 2008

Lighting designer Abigail Rosen Holmes had a collaborator, of sorts, on her latest tour design for The Cure’s 4 Tour. Her collaborator had lots of insight to the material, since he wrote most of it himself.

Front man Robert Smith “is very involved in the design of the show,” Holmes said. She and Smith exchanged sketches of the lighting system, projection, and stage layout before arriving at the final design. Then they tossed around ideas for the individual songs.

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The Jersey Boys in Las Vegas

All load-ins are a testament to the beauty of cooperation and madness. This gets amplified when you’re putting up the set as they’re finishing the theatre.

“They’re kind of building around us,” says Jim Fedigan, production electrician for the install of Jersey Boys in the Jersey Boys Theatre at the Palazzo Las Vegas — Resort, Hotel, Casino. We’re standing on the lip of the stage looking at lights that have been hung onto truss, and then wrapped in plastic bags to protect them from construction dust, which is everywhere. Fedigan started the load-in in a theatre that was far from complete.

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InfoComm 2008 – Some Like It Hot

Intense heat radiating from the streets and sidewalks outside of the Las Vegas Convention Center in June was no match for the cool gear at InfoComm 2008. True to form, LEDs, media servers and projection dominated the show, but not all exhibitors followed the formula. Some of them showed products to rig, power and network with LEDs, media servers and projection. Another dominant technology at the show was wireless DMX, with several dimming and control manufacturers offering it as an option as well as one or two automated lighting manufacturers.

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