Transporting Gear Without Cases

[DCATTechie]

In the middle of march, my school will be taking a full-length show to present at the Ohio EDTA State Conference. Judging from the handbook, it looks as if we will be allowed to bring our own gear for our show.

We plan on bringing:
1x Strand Palette VL
2x Acer V193 Monitor's
20x Source 4 26deg. Ellipsoidals
4x Source 4 15/30 Zooms
3x Source 4 25/50 Zooms
12x Source 4 Par EA's
Accessories(Gobos,Gobo Holders, Gel Frames, Gel Cuts, Spare Lamps)

Since we're on a tight budget and don't already own cases for this gear, I'm wondering what the safest way to transport these items is. It will be traveling in a rented box truck (size unknown as of now).

Also, we only have about an hour load-in/out time, so however we pack it needs to be organized, neat, efficient, and quick to load and unload.

Thanks for the help!

 

[mstaylor]

Take the lights and mount them on a pipe short enough to fit the truck, then lay them in 2 inch foam.

 

[DCATTechie]

Lenses facing toward the ground or sideways? And where could I get that much 2 inch foam?

 

[mstaylor]

Hang it on the pipe so the light is straight and then lay the whole pipe down so the lights are horizontal. I would check home supply, upholstery stores or frabric stores. Possibly an UPs or Ebay distrubution store may have it. If not get carpet pad and use layers.

 

[SHARYNF]

Cheapest foam might be a couple of those foam mattress pads

sharyn

 

[mstaylor]

Good suggestion Sharyn.

 

[jfleenor]

For the various accessories:

Depending on how much money you can spend on it:

- Buy plastic totes [clear is preferred] and organize items by box... with labels on the front.
- Buy large 'bankers boxes'. They're pretty sturdy, and have lids... as well as a place to write contents on the front
- Go to your neighborhood store and ask for used boxes that they would otherwise throw away. You might also try a chain bookstore. They generally have boxes after their weekly orders come in, and unlike boxes you get from grocery stores, nothing has leaked in them.

Hope this helps.

 

[venuetech]

create a "bed" of cable in the truck then lay the fixtures on top of the cable being carful of the shutter handels (be sure to push all shutters in before transit) if you need a second layer add some cable between layers.

 

[venuetech]

BTW The whole affair would be called "A Paper Bag Loadout"

 

[venuetech]

upon review of the confrence a question arises.
does the venue have a house plot that you could use?
this amount of equipment would need a lot of ground support to get it in the air and working. what are you taking to provide that support.

what you will need is to trim down to the very bacics and work with the house staff to get the most bang for your hour load in time.

call the venue soon and touch base with the tech director lay out your needs and he will lay out what he can do for you.

 

[avkid]

Do you have a shop with woodworking tools?

 

[fx120]

Last year we had a similar issue brought to us. Local school needing to travel with some of their gear (about 30 lekos and a handful of pars, and fresnels), but didn't have casing or a good way to move them.

We ended up renting them out a pair of spare 10' meat racks for $60 a week each.

You might call some local production shops and see if they have anything that you can use.

Hell if your school has a metal shop having them weld up a few meat racks might be a somewhat inexpensive endeavor that can also be great for around the theater use. They're not complicated and can be built cheaply out of 1.25" square stock and a few casters.

 

[derekleffew]

upon review of the conference a question arises.
does the venue have a house plot that you could use?
this amount of equipment would need a lot of ground support to get it in the air and working. what are you taking to provide that support.

what you will need is to trim down to the very basics and work with the house staff to get the most bang for your hour load in time.

call the venue soon and touch base with the tech director lay out your needs and he will lay out what he can do for you.

I agree that that's an unrealistic amount of gear based on a one-hour set-up time. I notice you don't have any touring dimmers listed, so are you planning on using house dimmers/circuits? Hanging your fixtures on house electrics? Loading counterweight? What if the house has an unusual patch, with houselight and stagelight dimmers mixed together? That alone could take an hour to sort out. Unless you're planning on bringing your own truss and hoists and only depending on the venue for power, I just don't see it happening.

 

[DCATTechie]

I realize that this is a large amount of gear to be taking on the road. However, this list is most likely to shrink a fair amount in the next few days. We will find out our performance space sometime after February 13th, which is when the ground plan and tech specs will be sent to us. Having never done a show there before I have no idea what gear is already in-house and that we are allowed to use. Therefore, I'm being extra cautious and planning on packing everything that we would need.

About the dimmer situation, you are correct in that we will be using the in-house dimming system, something I also know nothing about as of now. We will be making a trip up to see the space a couple weeks before our official load-in which is when I'll take a look at the patch and any other data/power issues that may come up. Again, depending on what the venue already has in there rig, and the dimmer/circuit count, this packing list may very well shrink a size-able amount.

We are not bringing our own truss, and plan on using the house lighting positions. If he is available while we are at the venue (ours is an unofficial trip), I'll talk to the TD and see what he can do.


We do have a shop with wood working tools, and our robotics team may be able to make us some meat racks, but they're schedule is PACKED.

 

[church]

Derek has a good point.

I routinely light choirs for one night cabarets etc. and I have to provide all the lighting, truss, crank ups, distro dimmers , console etc. I have a basic rig I take out for this that works with a twenty two foot wide risered stage. I only use a front and rear truss with a total of twenty six fixtures and it takes two hours to do a complete set up and load in when you can go straight through one door between truck and hall. with myself and one guy doing the work and a number of "volunteers" who are providing the muscle to move gear from truck to hall. The rear truss is pre-hung and wired to make things easier. The time goes on runing cables (running 500ft plus of cable safely and neatly takes time), cable trays etc. even when you are using soca. The challange with this type of work is how to get the most out of the least amount of gear and be able to do the work in the short times available. Increasing the number of people doing the hang only speeds the work to a point it quickly comes down to a small number of people.

It has already been said, ask the venue for their plot including drawings, patch, sight lines etc., work out how you can use the house plot and what you need as specials and only take the specials with you and if necessary filters to adjust their house plot. Ask the venue to have space to hang your specials on the grid and space in their patch to plug into.

You can get cheap strong boxes from UHaul and other moving companies.

Good luck this is always an enjoyable challange

 

[shayward]

What show are you performing, and does it really rely that heavily on the lighting equipment you are going to bring?

Having brought many full lenghth shows to this same conference in the past my advice is this: Use what they have at the performance site and alter your show to fit that. If I remember correctly this year's conference is at Ashland University which means you will probably be in their auditiorium if you are performing a full length show.

I would find out what their rep plot is going to be like for the conference, then plan how you can alter that quickly to fit your needs. It will save you so much time and keep you saine in that hour that you have. Just remember that you will also have to return the lights back to their rep positions & color after your performance.

Just keep in mind that everyone needs to be flexible in a "tour" situation like this. Just because something looked one way, or someone stood exactly in this position back home, doesnt mean it's going to go exactly that way at the conference on the new stage. You can work it so that it is very close to what it was, but it might have to be different.

 

[MNBallet]

I agree with your 1 hour load in time limit, you are not going to make it with that much lighting gear. That's about the time frame to just hang and circuit it, not focus.

On top of your time limit, you had mentioned that you know nothing yet of the theater you will be performing in yet. You don't even know what type of plug their circuits are. There is a good chance that you might have a twist-lock plug on all 20 or your Source Fours, and the theater is on a Stage Pin system (or visa-versa) You could be bringing a lot of gear only to find out you can't use it because you don't have adapters.

Use the house plot, and only hang your specials. Get adapters if you need them ahead of time.

Ken Pogin
Production / Tour Manager
Minnesota Ballet

 

[erosing]

From past expierience time won't allow what you want. The only instruments we ever brought with us to competitions in high school were our Source 4 follow spot rigs and about 5 extra source fours for specials, 1-19, 2-26's, 2-36's usually and just setting that up usually took close to the time limit on the smaller competitions. Best piece of advice I have for you no matter what you take, put the whatever you know is going to take the longest to set up right next to the doors on the truck.

 

[avkid]

What I was getting at when I mentioned woodworking tools is building crates.
Some 2x4 , 3/4" ply and good casters and you have rolling storage.

 

[DCATTechie]

Thanks for advice and words of wisdom so far!

I realize that a one hour time limit will not be enough time to hang, circuit, and focus all of these fixtures. However, like I stated earlier, this list of gear will most likely shrink drastically. We will find out about our performance space sometime soon after February 13th when the Committee sets the final schedule. Also, before our first load-in, a couple of us will be taking an unofficial trip up to our eventual venue to check lighting positions, and their house rep-plot. After that trip, I will revise this list to only the gear that we ABSOLUTELY need. I was just planning ahead and playing it safe (possibly too safe), so when the list was finalized, I would, without a doubt, have a way to transport all the gear that we would need, safely.

The show we are taking is called 'The Island of Dr. Moreau', and the conference is being held at Ashland University in Ohio.