Bolted fixtures.... Man’ that’s harsh.
Front lights are using DYS lamps, .... let me get this straight, you have ray lights (basically flash lights with round beams of light) providing the front light for your
stage? Who designed this place, some backwards rock and
roll DJ? While I love Lavender, it’s a color for magical instances and not normal lighting. A Lavender/light blue and amber gelling ha as the only two colors ha?
No color blue and surprise pink pop up in my head as a start on other white light colors. What color of amber are the lights also?
Time to start saving up money for a new - professionally done lighting package. Done so the
system does not change ha? Theater done by maintinence people for a lecture
hall purpose.
Consider this your repertory
plot - something that does not change in the use of it for
auditorium lecture purposes. Given this
truss up front, save up money and invest into a show lighting package independent of it. Go especially for a
truss in a back of audience position that you can raise and lower by way of
hoist to make it easier to change out fixtures. If possible also get the rep.
truss so mounted given it’s strong enough to mount more fixtures. Have
drop boxes installed on the
FOH two light bar trusses for the new circuits, and run backstage to at least a 48 way
dimmer pack. I have no doubts this theater if older was designed without front of
house lighting, much less to save money, someone at some time
dead hung a
truss and mounted some permanent fixtures to the
truss so that they would stay fixed to the positions required. This is the group think type front office or maintenance staff over riding any actual theater program. It’s not unusual to see, nor is it unusual for such a
layout not to have real front of
house positions and electrics, than stuff added but out of liability, such equipment made so that students were not allowed to
play with them as a theory. Lighting and sound up until about 30 years ago was part of
stage setting design still for the most part, much less even at this
point, the director and a helper did it all. Sound design is probably only a 15 year old field of study in fact.
Over the
stage, you have not spoken of
dead hung pipes, flown pipes and electrics
etc. not all lighting is best as a front light even if on an angle unless your
stage depth is only 10' deep. Side light, top light, back light and overhead specials have their place in design also. Much less most theaters will have had some pipes installed for boarders or tormentors. (Tormentors I think of by term as a soft
flat that’s covered in fabric as opposed to a hanging drape though there is a lot of grey area.)
Your back wall by drawing seems to be forced perspective in terminating, it’s also a
cyc wall in that it is no doubt a smooth surface for projections of things like sunsets.
No
curtains except the main drape. How deep is the
stage?
Normally when you describe a
stage, you describe the
proscenium opening by way of width and height, than depth of
stage. I assume you also don’t have a fly
system, much less since you don’t have tormenters or legs, you don’t have teasers or boarders in drape overhead for
masking. Must be a really shallow
stage, or someone thought that all the settings would be box set style that would provide it’s own
masking. Given the back wall, you might be able to find in searching the building your missing legs that were provided with the install no doubt. Normally such things will have been provided in even the most idiot architect designed place. Given your
up stage pass behind of the
cyc wall, this place had at one early
point been designed decently. Let me guess about your schools’ theater age.... before 1954? Such drape if you can find them or they did not get tattered and thrown out would if found, need to be cleaned and re-fire proofed but probably be in good condition. My guess is that someone took them down at some
point to make way for a box set. Normally such theaters will have had such equipment provided with the initial install especially if it has a
cyc wall with a sloped end to it.
Ok, onto advice, you have ray lights in the front of
house, no Lekos and Fresnels, just wide beam flashlights. Assuming that you can’t swap lamps out for normal
PAR lamps which have an oval beam at least, covering your
stage with an even field of light across the entire
stage might be difficult. Go with some heavy silk in addition to the
gel to orientate the beam of light more into an oval and better
wash coverage. Importance of Being Earnest (was board by it) but it’s a parlor
wing and
drop or at least box set show with lots of doors and things to hide behind. You might need various specials also to light the actors in hiding. (Been a while since the last time I saw it thus details
escape me beyond falling asleep.) If you only have two colors to
gel with, sure, perhaps amber and lavender as colors in the lavender adding some coloration to the
stage at least, but it’s more a magical quality color in that it’s not something you find in a natural lighting environment. This is a problem as there is no magic to Importance. I might go amber/pink from the front and some cooler blue from the rear in this realism type
play. At least you are not lighting it with gas lit or candle
foot lights and chandeliers as it will have otherwise been done.
This could also be a design
element however. Think the harsh bad lighting done by this classic style of lighting the
stage when this
play was written. Think even the blue/white
carbon arc harsh lighting angles which in harshness might be able to have an
effect by way of lighting design on the show over just lighting the
stage. Your intent so far is
McCandless in 45 degrees from each direction from the front - given two colors, than something from the rear. Given your theater space and lack of lighting, perhaps a general
wash of light from the front top, even dead on from the
truss for the
stage without any lighting angles to the fixtures. Go harsh, make them amber from a candle. Use 8 fixtures or if possible 6. Put four more on the floor from the
down stage, or better yet, use eight fixtures as side light in a blue/green color. Better yet, do away with all
FOH lights and go
wing and
drop/
boom side
stage lighting - as well might have been the way this theater was designed to light from.
Say two or four instruments from the floor
down stage and 12 from the wings. Coloring in white/pinks and ambers and light blues would do well in matching this show to how it will have classically been lit.
If more of a box set, why not interrupt the walls going upstage to
downstage without a seam and have the walls interrupted with a doorway or offset of the
flat in allowing space for the lighting to project from in covering the
stage.
But on the subject of down lighting, assuming you mounting fixtures to the box set or
cyc wall, is it possible to mount a pipe spanning this
cyc wall across the
stage so you can get the fixtures more upstage of it in giving less of an angle the audience can see? Yes backlight shining in the audiences eyes when they are not paying for rock and
roll audience blinders is probably not a good thing. What ever the case, think
tormentor as I describe above. A soft
flat with
duvetyne covering on it hanging across the ceiling and
masking the lights from the front row of the audience, yet still allowing room for lights from the rear to light the
stage or at least their zone. Raising this lighting pipe mounted to the
cyc wall might also be of use for doing this, or at least
masking off the
cyc wall at it’s upper end given directly mounted fixtures.
In renting/buying given the no doubt small budget, I might instead of renting, do at least away with some of the 12 fixtures at the
house position. Invest your money into spot or medium flood lamps for the front of
house - depending upon the
throw distance. These at least oval if not much wider beams of light will allow you to do more with less fixtures. Are you sure all fixtures are mounted with ray light kits?
A
PAR is some mis-opportunity connivance of a combination between a
Fresnel and
Leko in providing a light beam that is sort of both. Given a rental budget, instead invest in better lamps for the front if not all fixtures in making what you have more useful as a long term solution both for this show and especially ones to follow where you will no doubt have more budget to rent or perhaps buy fixtures to supplement the trash cans.
Go wide flood for instance for the
proscenium mounted fixtures. Too bad the
halogen 600w
PAR 64 lamps are no longer sold. The
incandescent 500w
PAR 64 lamp will be a pale comparison to the
dichroic halogen ray light lamps where brightness and
color temperature is involved. If you have the
power available, perhaps you can go with three instead of four fixtures per
circuit in using 800w
PAR 64 “
Power Saver” lamps from GE. These lamps are 117.5v instead of 120v which means that above it’s 3,250°K
color temperature, due to operating over
voltage but not quite as much as a
Leko by way of
voltage, it will have a very much blue/white similar
color temperature to that of a S-4
fixture. In other words, you will get a very hot and seemingly bright source of light. The output also is going to be just about as much but not quite as much as a 1,000w
PAR can fixture.
The beam of light than becomes as opposed to just about 12° from each
fixture between 9x9°, 21x26° and 21x44° in beam spread of the
beam angle which is 50% of the
field angle or light beam’s
edge. Get the
point? Given your DYS lamps within a
reflector, unless some modern version of the Ray Light in being available in wider beam spread reflectors, it’s probably going to have about a eight degree
beam angle to it in looking like a huge flash light. Go with wider lamps and while you loose general
intensity which is probably too bright for the shaft of light, you disperse the light outwards in covering more
stage with less fixtures.
Cover more of the
stage, you need less fixtures to do so and can use more of them elsewhere. I have no idea how wide the
stage is, but given 12 very narrow beams of light from the front of the
stage, it’s probably not much over 20'. My goal would be at most half the fixtures from the front if not at most 2/3 of them given I was not
wing and
drop (side light) that the
PAR fixture might be better off in as a position. Put some wide flood ambers in your
proscenium fixtures with the same color of warm amber. Go with the rest of the 12 fixtures as a side light, two from high, one low each side on two booms. Low color should be perhaps some form of light pink, the above some form of light amber and perhaps medium blue.
In taking fixtures away from the front pipe, but the same number of them (granted three instead of four per
circuit, or one instead of two - dependant upon the dimmers) you than could run extension cords to the
FOH empty circuits and
power up as normal. If this
house has a
fire curtain you are not allowed to break the
fire curtain line by stringing cords other than upon the floor/
stage where the seal would
cover it. In other words, given a
fire curtain, it’s going to be a long length of a lot of cables running backstage. Given an other than at ceiling run from
FOH to the
stage, you will need to rent or buy more dimmers.
bdesmond’s reply, the intent was to screw the fixtures to the top plate of the wall not the individual studs. Given a lumber double top plate, or even single one, anywhere would be sufficient for a lighting
fixture to
lag into the wall. The
yoke also is sufficient as a
heat sink to prevent the fire hazzard as long as the top of the wall is painted and fairly well dust free.
By the way, find them dimmers. Should a
circuit be overloaded, a thermal
breaker on them will pop. It would be good if during
intermission you can get out a ladder and re-set the
dimmer pack.