Snow effect?????

mike80

Member
Hey Everyone,
I'm lighitng a production of HONK. The musical about the ugly duckling.
In said show there is a massive snowstorm. The budget for the show originally included the full snow effect. However, due to some last minute changes by the director - Surprise, surprise. The budget has gone into a giant leaf that will drop from the flys.
So at the last meeting I heard those immortal words "Oh, don't worry we can fix it with lighting"
I am now 3 days away from the hang and I need to 'create' a snow effect.
I have a decent number of lights at my disposal that aren't already in the hang, Source 4's and 3380's 6 of each and 2 gobo rotators.
Does anyone have any bright ideas?
It is the main reveal scene when 'Ugly' becomes not.
Thanks for the chance to rant.
Cheers.
 
Hi Mike,

I have done the same production, although it was Honk Jr! for a younger version. We used a physical snow (the old fashion two timbers,a sheet with holes, some paper, pulleys and some rope) but in your case I can see what your saying (and boy oh boy do I love those budget cuts!)

If you have plenty of fixtures free AND a gobo rotator, I would suggest blasting the stage with some deckles or breakups. Placing them at odd angles (maybe some floor mounted fixtures on H-stands, some in the rig, and using the gobo rotators from behind may give some interesting effects. If you pump some smoke or haze, that might give the scene a bit more texture and also help with the transformation scene.

For my gig, I did the paper and some smoke with some slowly chasing deckles from behind, and it worked a charm even without the paper. So its a possibility if you have the fixtures. Place a few around the place, floor, grid, and in strange positions. It might add a new dimension to the show!

Good Luck! Let us know how it goes.


P.S. If you dont have that many gobo's, just make a few up, its snow, it doesn't have to be perfect!
 
Yeah it won't be amazing but two gobo rotators carefully shuttered off so you only see the snow going down will do the basic trick. If you had time and money you could rent some better lighting tricks but for what you've got that should work.
 
Yeah it won't be amazing but two gobo rotators carefully shuttered off so you only see the snow going down will do the basic trick. If you had time and money you could rent some better lighting tricks but for what you've got that should work.


That's exactly right. When a wider beam spread barrel is used with an ERS (Source Fours in this case), you may shutter cut the rotation to project ONLY the falling portion of the gobo image area. Viola! Your snow gobos (ar any small hole gobos) will take on the effect of snowflakes. When atmosphere is used- it's a really great effect!

(And affordable too!)
 
Do you have any budget left at all??? Perhaps you could rent a couple more rotators, or look for the GAM Film/FX...it makes great snow!! Throw a couple more units in the mix along with the rotators already in the inventory and you'll have a nice little storm.
 
I love HONK!
I did it several years ago. The blizzard is a challenge. I tried my moving fixtures (your gobo rotators might be good for that.)
But I ended up getting a large piece of cheap blue fabric. I put white gloves on the deck crew. They rippled the fabric and we had the actors (three; cat, Honk and stand-in Honk)a slit in the middle so the cat got frozen and the stand-in gave Honk enough time to change into his swan costume. Very "Kabuki" based but still works its magic. I did use some of our Martin fixtures but the fabric alone also looked good.
I would advise any educational musical directors to check out HONK! It won the Olivier over The Lion King. Good parts for lots of featured players.
We were a huge hit.
 

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