Focus Session - Laser?

[gafftaper]

I don't know why I missed this thread earlier. But here's my 2 cents worth. I use the same procedure Footer and Van described if at all possible.

However, under your circumstances, if it was just me, a director and some newbies this is what I would do...

1) Clearly mark out the center of each area on stage so you can tell a newbie to stand on the big read #1 and they can follow along.

2) Leave your director on the board... it makes them feel important... it's also a really boring job.

3) You take one or two newbies with you up in the catwalks. You focus yourself for a while then you turn it over to them. Once you turn it over to them you scoot back and forth between the two newbies and help them clean up their work. They can quickly learn to pull the shutter cuts out, sharpen for focus, aim the hot spot and begin the shutter cuts... you then step in and help them finish the shutter cuts the way you want and soften as needed. While you are doing that with newbie #1, newbie #2 can be getting set up on the next instrument.

It's a lot slower than having pros do it but you are training for the future. Next time they'll be faster. The time after that maybe you can run it from the deck like we do.

 

[BenFranske]

FWIW I usually have the LD on stage standing in each area while student crew focuses lights on them as a few of the others have indicated. In my experience It's difficult for new crew members to get the idea of focusing to empty areas on stage and is much easier to focus on a person, the most efficient person to have on stage is the LD because they know where they want the lights focused.

 

[DarSax]

No people? Steal some road cones and brooms.

 

[Van]

No people? Steal some road cones and brooms.

Our M.E. built an X out of 1x4 stood a 6' piece out of the center of it put a 3' crossbar on it at about shoulder height and calls it the ALD. works great when we have a small electrics crew.

 

[soundlight]

We like to use boom mic stands with shirts over them for dummies on stage. We put them at different places when designing so that we know how it's gonna read on the clothing. But in general, there's always a person to focus on when we're doing a real focus session.

 

[Andy_Leviss]

I find [Tools for Stagecraft's] prices reasonable and competitive. I can find better prices for expendables elsewhere, but I got a gam check and a pin splitter from them for less then what I could get from barbizon.

I've found their either on par with list or grossly overpriced; I've never seen a good deal through them, however. As one of the more egregious examples, look at pricing for the Wavetek DM-73B pen style multimeter. TfS sells it for $64.95 (I seem to remember it being even higher at one point, although I might be wrong on that). This is $13 MORE than the manufacturer's list price of $51.95, and you can find it a number of places online for as low as $45.

(I will point out that FilmTools.com manages to top TfS's obscene price with an even more disgusting $81 and change!)

The only products I've ever purchased from them were their toolbelt back when I was doing more general stagehand type stuff, because I could only find that particular design there, and a Photon Micro Light, because they had the same price as everybody else and I could get it in person at their USITT booth. Every other item I've shopped for somebody else has had far cheaper. Multi-tools, Ripoffs pouches, etc.

On a tangential note, they are the one place I know of that sells the original Leatherman Wave, or at least had some in stock as of a few months ago. If anybody knows of another source, let me know, mine got lost on a gig, despite having my name engraved on it! (So if you see one somewhere with my name, grab it and let me know

--Andy

 

[Charc]

I have got to get the hang of this LD business!

I've seen the diagrams with acting areas a thousand times, but they've never made sense to me. All the pre-load in work is a mystery to me. Because I more or less live in our theater I just spend free time in there working. If I get out of my lab early, I fire up the board, pull up a cue, ask myself what's missing, and go up and focus it. I can't even fathom having to design the entire light-plot ahead of time, and on paper! My god. I think I'm more and more getting to understand the artistic sense of the job (always learning, though!) but I'm still having a tough time grasping the technical side of the job, so to speak. After reading all your posts over the last several weeks about how to design, I feel ashamed that I've never focused on a person in my life. To be honest, it's always been circles on the floor. When rehearsals role around, and I realize that it's not hitting someone just right, that's when changes occur. I guess I'm more designing (if you could call it that!) light for the floor, set, and mood; not for the "walking props".

 

[DarSax]

Leatherman wave? I have one of those....didn't know it was a hot commodity :O

Fun fact: For a while I thought it was acceptable to focus lights on a closed curtain, for areas that were behind the curtain. "If it looks symmetrical and pretty on a curtain, it'll look that way on the floor!"

 

[soundlight]

Fun fact: For a while I thought it was acceptable to focus lights on a closed curtain, for areas that were behind the curtain. "If it looks symmetrical and pretty on a curtain, it'll look that way on the floor!"

Well, if you know how high up you have to be to hit the area that's just in front of the cyc, it's somewhat easy. I like this method. But ya still have you know what you're doing! I didn't think that anyone else did this. The only thing that I have a hard time doing with this is getting the focus right.

 

[gogotoovee]

Okay okay, I stand corrected....sheesh.

 

[propmonkey]

id like to get one of the cut outs of famous people and use it for a focus dumby

 

[Van]

I've got a life sized cutout of Ronald Regan mounted on a remote control car chassis that we used for Assassins last year, guess I'm going to have to give it to the Electrics department now.

 

[Andy_Leviss]

Leatherman wave? I have one of those....didn't know it was a hot commodity :O

Not any Wave, the original Wave. The new one has interchangeable bits for the drivers which, while a good idea in theory, become a very bad idea the first time you lose one of the bits!

 

[DarSax]

Ah, good point, noticed that just before you posted. I have the new one, unfortunately. (Or fortunately, as I do like it). Does Leatherman not sell replacement bits? That'd be surprising, if they didn't

 

[avkid]

Does Leatherman not sell replacement bits? That'd be surprising, if they didn't

Bit Kits and Drivers

This place has the old Wave:
http://www.instawares.com/multi-tool-wave-black.wyn-830246.0.7.htm

 

[Footer]

Leatherman wave? I have one of those....didn't know it was a hot commodity :O
Fun fact: For a while I thought it was acceptable to focus lights on a closed curtain, for areas that were behind the curtain. "If it looks symmetrical and pretty on a curtain, it'll look that way on the floor!"

If dealing with a main rag of any kind, I usually develop a system specifically for it. Scallops on the main look very crappy. Also, during an overture you can actually do something with it!.

 

[DarSax]

Man, I would love to have enough dimmers and fixtures to do that!

And for that matter, better fixtures. I usually give up on my rusting equipment and get the job done, but when the curtain is closed and everything is up......oh god, ew.

 

[soundlight]

We had some fun curtain warmers for our dance concert this past fall. We had VL3000's from the proscenium pipe shooting the stock open/outline 6 flower petals gobo across the front of the curtain, with CMY changing constantly. There were also some S4 par washes on it, and it looked really cool. That's curtain warmers for ya!

 

[photoatdv]

Charc,
I agree the paperwork part is much more tedious than the designing. For my last big show I did all the pre-production plots and even had the patch, subs, ect figured out. Then I got to production and pretty much threw all that out and did it the way I always do (figure out the general design then do the rest as I go). Actually, I tried to stick to it for most of the first rehearsal, but was so busy with that that I couldn't do any good designing. So it went bye-bye.