eSET Back Online

[MNicolai]

Hi -
Thanks so much for your patience through this upgrade. We have finished the Glossary terms and they are available to you. The PDFs and Assessments will be uploaded soon. Your subscription will be extended for a year after they are online.
You should be able to log-in now and start perusing the expanded glossary.

Please let me know if you have problems or you can use the comments/feedback function on the site.

ESTA Foundation - Essential Skills for the Entertainment Technician

Best regards,

Frances Thompson
The ESTA Foundation

This is fantastic! I was a little bit nervous because just shortly after I became a member, they took it offline and have spent the better part of a year cleaning it up, and now have re-upped the memberships upon taking it back online.

eSET is a great resource filled with all of the theatrical terms under the sun. It has 2,294 terms in its database as of right now, which are divided up into the appropriate categories of:

• Audio/Sound
• Costume
• EFX/Effects
• Lighting & Electrics
• Multimedia/Projection
• Properties/Set Dressing
• Rigging
• Safety
• Staging/Scenic Fabrication
• Venue

ESTA is also working on getting PDF's up of assessments that can be given to people to gauge their knowledge of a given discipline, and general PDF's describing the different disciplines.

The goal of eSET is to help educate workers in the entertainment industry on the appropriate terminology for everything, and standardize the jargon while reducing the slang. Here in the Midwest, it feels like it's every few months I encounter a road show that disagrees on what west-coasting a drop versus east-coasting it is. eSET is an attempt to reduce confusion and make all of us better at what we do.

 

[Anvilx]

Is eSET just a dictionary type reference? Or does have information on the practical use of of things? White papers?

 

[derekleffew]

... Here in the Midwest, it feels like it's every few months I encounter a road show that disagrees on what west-coasting a drop versus east-coasting it is. eSET is an attempt to reduce confusion and make all of us better at what we do.

Speaking as a member of the eSET committee,
Certain terms have evolved to mean so many different things to different people that they probably shouldn't be used at all, and you've hit one one (two if one counts east-coasting), as they only add confusion. The community can't even agree on whether the proper term is west-coasting, westcoasting, or west coasting.

Anvilx, to answer your questions: the eSET Glossary is a list of terms with rudimentary definitions. No elaboration, nor illustrations, nor examples are included. It is intended to provide only fundamental or introductory knowledge.

 

[MNicolai]

We have at least two eSET committee members here at CB, if I'm not mistaken. Aside from Derek, dwt1 is also a committee member, but he's not logged in at CB since September. Could you or him comment on the changes that have taken place since the original launch of the program, and if ESTA has any eventual goals for eSET beyond being an entertainment industry dictionary?

 

[sk8rsdad]

I had a look and was immediately stumped on which fee would apply to me, being neither a student, nor a professional, but clearly falling under the umbrella of "educational and charitable programs for the entertainment technology industry". What is the fee for enthusiastic volunteer?

 

[derekleffew]

The eSET Glossary "went live" prematurely, before everyone was allowed an opportunity to provide input, which is why it was removed for a time. The new version is greatly improved.

The name of the program, Essential Skills for Entertainment Technicians, sums up the goals: to provide training and evaluation for the introductory stagehand. Much more is in the works, but the only aspects publicly available are the Glossary and some Assessments. See also the threadeset: we speak tech, and the site ESTA/eSET.

sk8rsdad, as there's no "<!-- google_ad_section_end -->enthusiastic volunteer" category, you must, for this purpose only, be considered a professional. Unless you can provide an active and valid student (high school, college, or trade school) I.D.

 

[MNicolai]

It seems as though eSET has chosen to acknowledge West Coasting, but under the vaguest of terms. They do not have a definition for East Coasting.

Gathering and tying soft goods together for storage

I think if they should choose to acknowledge a term, they should nail it to the wall in gross detail such that there's no room for confusion. This seems as if they simply couldn't decide on how to apply the definition so they left it vague.

I thought that the goal of eSET was to provide standards for the entertainment industry, NFPA "explained as well as it needs to be" style. The more I page through, the more I get the impression that they were trying (again) to provide a regurgitation of a lot of different terms, rather than standardize a particular few.

Not to cause controversy, but I prefer CB's glossary because it has details and pictures. eSET is nice because it's easy(-ier) to navigate and look at one category of terms, but yet so many of the terms have definitions of "See ____" but don't directly link to the definition they want you to look at. This makes it a far more complicated process to actually get where you want to go.

I also find myself unhappy with their choices for synonyms. There's a difference between a synonym and and an example. A Source Four and a Leko are both examples of an Ellipsoidal Reflector Spotlight, but are not synonymous terms to be used interchangeably.

Luminaire which projects light via an elliptical reflector and a lens system.
Synonym: Ellipsoidal, ERS, Leko®, Profile, Source 4®

I know this will be a project that will be worked on for years to come; CB's glossary certainly wasn't built in a day, but eSET does have a ways to come yet.

CB's glossary is more like a textbook, providing examples, definitions, and points of interest, while eSET is a dictionary containing just definitions (for now).

I'll keep an eye on eSET. I certainly don't want to close the book on it right away when I know they're still working hard on it, but I'd suggest people hesitate before jumping at subscribing with hopes you'll find answers to all of your questions. It's useful, but it's not a textbook. Don't expect for this to be your most valuable resource -- merely something that compliments other resources you already have at your availability.

 

[dwt1]

Hi Folks:

Thanks for the new discussion of eSET and for the positive comments. To address the future of eSET, our plan is to provide a web based educational tool which will include assessments, skills, video instruction, data sheets to all equipment identified, manufacturer generated how-to guides and a means to organize the material most important to the individual user.

At present, it is a glossary but with well over 2000 terms it has taken us quite some time to develop the definitions much less simply identify the terms. As Derek noted, our industry has trouble agreeing on terminology and eSET has attempted to identify the "correct" term as opposed to the jargon. Those definistions are brief and lack the examples you mention. Those however, will appear in the future although the bare bones "body of knowledge" will remain pretty much as is other than for needed revisions.

eSET's goals are lofty and it will take time and money but the end product will be well worth the effort.

If any of you on the list are regulars at LDI and USITT or from the Dallas area you may wish to get involved with the project. Go to the ESTA Foundation website at The ESTA Foundation - Creating and supporting educational and charitable programs for the entertainment technology industry click on Essential Skills and follow the "volunteers" link at the top of the page.

Thanks for your input.

Dana