Automated Fixtures What has training come to?

[photoatdv]

So I was on a show site the other day and a couple of fixtures were acting up. I asked my L2 (who'd already shown a proficiency with setting up and programming movers) to help with troubleshooting. The conversation went like this:

Me: Hey John (name changed), unit 3 seems to have an issue with the color wheel.
Would you mind taking a look at that light for me?

John: Sure, what do you want me to check?

Me: Can you take a look at the color wheel and see if it's mechanical or sensors?

John: Sure. (scampers up ladder and stares at light) So how do I find the color wheel?

Me: What do you mean? I'm pretty sure you'll see it if you take the cover off...

John: Erm, how do I do that???

Me: I though you said you had lots of experience with movers?

John: I do!!! It's not like I've ever had to take them apart or anything!

Me: Nevermind

So yeah, HOW exactly does one have lots of experience with movers yet not have the slightest clue how to take a cover off? I've had seniors and grads from university lighting programs with moving lights who don't even know how one works. I'm sorry, but I expect anyone who's a lighting designer, director, programmer, or ME to at least know major parts of a moving light. Knowing how to fix very basic things is useful, but for the most part I'll settle for at least knowing what I'm talking about. And if one more so called lighting grad asks me how a moving light works (and legitimately hasn't the slightest clue I think I may scream). Of course every time I do a show at a school (pretty much middle school through college) I end up doing the 5 minute version of how movers work about 15 times (which I don't mind as long as it's not for someone with an MFA in lighting design!)

 

[MNicolai]

I've always kept my expectations kind of low after running into someone with a BFA in Theatre Design/Technology who landed a job as an ATD and then one day went up to the TD during a load-in to ask:

What is a DMX and where do we have one?

 

[shiben]

I've always kept my expectations kind of low after running into someone with a BFA in Theatre Design/Technology who landed a job as an ATD and then one day went up to the TD during a load-in to ask:

See, thats bad. However, I would not be very supprised at all if someone who came out of a very art based program had never bothered to dissasemble one. Many times like that you get the idea that you are training towords design, and that doesnt always lead itself to mechanical knowledge. As for me, I have not the foggiest idea about how the innards of a moving head work, but I bet I can make some pretty sweet looks with them! Does that then make me a bad designer, or just the victim of a poor theatre program?

 

[RockyPneumonia]

Does that then make me a bad designer, or just the victim of a poor theatre program?

...Or neither. Two of the best designers I know -- working at a very high level, internationally -- don't know the basic of electricity, and y'know what? The audience doesn't care.

 

[derekleffew]

One needn't know the intricacies of the workings of the internal combustion engine in order to operate a motor vehicle. I wouldn't (necessarily) expect a BFA/MFA candidate to be able to perform the duties of a Moving Light Tech. I also wouldn't necessarily expect him/her to know how to program a grandPA 2000 console. Conversely though, I would expect a programmer to be able to additively/subtractively mix color, have a sense of timing, rhythm, etc. In a way this ties in with this thread: http://www.controlbooth.com/forums/lighting-electrics/24385-artist-technician.html . I wonder whether Gafftaper, NevilleLighting, dbtheTD, Drmafreek, JohnHuntington, et al teach moving light maintenance, programming, electrical skills, etc., to their design students, and to what extent?

photoatdv (please take this in the spirit in which it is given): you seem to devote much of your time here detailing/complaining about the perceived shortcomings of your crew members. I find it tiresome always hearing about how much better you are than everyone else, and I suspect those with whom you work do also.

 

[sarahsliefie]

I was working up in our loft one time and needed a C-wrench. I told a Sr in Stage design to go get one for me. his response.

What is it

I just about had a heart attack.

One of the universities 50 miles away do not even have movers to teach with. They are too expensive for them. now if I were looking at getting an MFA there that would be one of the things I would ask about. I think one of the things is that the tech is moving too fast for the teachers. I can across a Professor that was still teaching 1x3 muslin covered flats lashed together as the main way to make sets. They are so stuck in their old school ways they do not stay on the cutting edge, and the students think that is what all the theater world is.

 

[icewolf08]

So yeah, HOW exactly does one have lots of experience with movers yet not have the slightest clue how to take a cover off? I've had seniors and grads from university lighting programs with moving lights who don't even know how one works. I'm sorry, but I expect anyone who's a lighting designer, director, programmer, or ME to at least know major parts of a moving light. Knowing how to fix very basic things is useful, but for the most part I'll settle for at least knowing what I'm talking about. And if one more so called lighting grad asks me how a moving light works (and legitimately hasn't the slightest clue I think I may scream). Of course every time I do a show at a school (pretty much middle school through college) I end up doing the 5 minute version of how movers work about 15 times (which I don't mind as long as it's not for someone with an MFA in lighting design!)

I have to agree and reiterate what people have been saying. Just because you have a degree, even if you went to the "best" theatre program in the country doesn't mean that you learned to take apart a lighting fixture, let alone a moving light. I am sure that in your first year in the program you probably learned to change a lamp, but not everyone has had the opportunity to learn/do some of the simplest maintenance, like change the lamp socket in a source four. When I was in college (which wasn't that long ago compared to some of our members), we only had a couple moving lights that we didn't get until partway through my college career. I can tell you that at the time, there were not may people who got to see them with the covers off, let alone do any work inside them.

Is it good to have basic understanding of how moving lights function if you are a technician at a shop or venue that owns them, yes. I would not, however, expect every technician who walks in the door with a college degree to know how to to basic service on a moving light. This is why all the manufacturers have their own technician training programs. Moving lights are pretty serious complex beasts.

 

[VL5]

Im a junior in high school, I program grandMA and hog, oh yeah by the way I also am in charge of maintaing a 40 fixture moving light inventory for a company, Im not saying this to make that guy look like a idiot but I think everyone should know how to rip a mover apart and put it back together without a diagram before they even touch a console.

 

[shiben]

Im a junior in high school, I program grandMA and hog, oh yeah by the way I also am in charge of maintaing a 40 fixture moving light inventory for a company, Im not saying this to make that guy look like a idiot but I think everyone should know how to rip a mover apart and put it back together without a diagram before they even touch a console.

Why?

I guess Ill have to brush up on my dictation of levels skills.

 

[icewolf08]

I was working up in our loft one time and needed a C-wrench. I told a Sr in Stage design to go get one for me. his response.

I just about had a heart attack.

One of the universities 50 miles away do not even have movers to teach with. They are too expensive for them. now if I were looking at getting an MFA there that would be one of the things I would ask about. I think one of the things is that the tech is moving too fast for the teachers. I can across a Professor that was still teaching 1x3 muslin covered flats lashed together as the main way to make sets. They are so stuck in their old school ways they do not stay on the cutting edge, and the students think that is what all the theater world is.

Again, there is nothing wrong with this, many theatres around the country still build and utilize muslin covered "Broadway" flats. Fact is, they are significantly cheaper to build and easier to paint, and they get the job done just as good as a luan-faced "Hollywood" flat. When you really think about it, the technology of theatre isn't really moving any faster today than it ever has. People are just jumping on the new technology and there is an abundance of new stuff that is becoming more affordable. However, the practical use and operation of things like moving lights hasn't really changed since the first DMX controlled moving light was sold. The concepts behind todays computer based lighting controllers are the same as those from years past, we can just do more today.

Working with moving lights in school doesn't make you a better designer. Any designer worth hiring would be able to design a show and utilize moving lights even if they never worked with them before, because it is just another tool in the toolbox. Now, you would need a good programmer, who knew how to put your ideas into the console, but that is a totally different story. Seeing as the bulk of MFA programs are design programs and not tech programs, you probably aren't going to find on that will make you as good a programmer as the kid who got their undergrad degree and then spent the next 6 years programming on rigs with multiple moving lights.

There is a huge difference between learning to use moving lights as a design and learning to work with them as a technician.

 

[shiben]

Working with moving lights in school doesn't make you a better designer. Any designer worth hiring would be able to design a show and utilize moving lights even if they never worked with them before, because it is just another tool in the toolbox. Now, you would need a good programmer, who knew how to put your ideas into the console, but that is a totally different story. Seeing as the bulk of MFA programs are design programs and not tech programs, you probably aren't going to find on that will make you as good a programmer as the kid who got their undergrad degree and then spent the next 6 years programming on rigs with multiple moving lights.

There is a huge difference between learning to use moving lights as a design and learning to work with them as a technician.

This is exactly what Im trying to get at. Honestly, more and more I am caring less and less what gets put on the pipe and pretty exclusively about what it does... As the ME for my theatre (no MLs or nothin), I need to care a lot, but when designing my own shows, if it makes light and can be colored its probably good. Same goes for MLs, as a designer I dont particularly care how it makes an audience bally, just that it does.

 

[icewolf08]

Im a junior in high school, I program grandMA and hog, oh yeah by the way I also am in charge of maintaing a 40 fixture moving light inventory for a company, Im not saying this to make that guy look like a idiot but I think everyone should know how to rip a mover apart and put it back together without a diagram before they even touch a console.

I am not saying this to make you look like an idiot, but it is an attitude like this that will quickly put you on the bad side of many college professors and potential employers. When/if you go to college for theatre, you will sit through all the same classes as the kid from Podunk, USA who had 20 analog dimmers and a 2-scene preset board. There will also come a day when the subject they are talking about in class is one that you have never heard of, but that kid from Podunk has, and hopefully when that day comes you haven't written off that class because you thought you already knew what was being taught because you "programmed grandMA and hog," were also "in charge of maintaing a 40 fixture moving light inventory."

It sounds like you are on your way with a good education, but it doesn't make you any better a technician than that kid from Podunk. Also, if I were to hire you as one of my employees, you better believe that I don't care what you were taught, when you walk into my theatre you do things my way.

 

[Pie4Weebl]

Im a junior in high school, I program grandMA and hog, oh yeah by the way I also am in charge of maintaing a 40 fixture moving light inventory for a company, Im not saying this to make that guy look like a idiot but I think everyone should know how to rip a mover apart and put it back together without a diagram before they even touch a console.

Wow that's really impressive for a highschooler, how did you manage to land that position?

 

[derekleffew]

...but I think everyone should know how to rip a mover apart and put it back together without a diagram before they even touch a console.

Um, no.

The programmer should know the capabilities of the instruments (gobo/prism/color mixing/internal macros/etc.), but not necessarily that one needs a T10 wrench to replace servo motor#2, which controls tilt, after first disconnecting the drive belt. Many great programmers I work with wouldn't know a positional encoder from a hall sensor, and that's okay, as many ML Techs wouldn't know how to pixel map a media server to an irregular surface mask on layer 4.

 

[VL5]

Sorry guys, Did not mean to have a attitude at all. The only reason is I get a tiny bit irritated when I see "professionals" not know how to maintain there own gear, or when your the new guy on the site and you have to fix something you have been doing for a year and the guy that has been doing it for 20 cant, I started with a internship when I was 13, I was setting up broadway nationals, my house is a road house, then we got vari-lite equipment, so I learned how to maintain that, then I ran into a fellow who one of my designer friends rented gear through, I gave him my name after the show and told him i knew how to fix VL equipment, but he had martin so I tried it and found it easy......ish haha so now i manage his moving light inventory. I also am a summer guy for another company that im sure some of you have heard of East Coast Lighting and Production Services (ECLPS). HOWEVER!!! I will take back what I said about learning how to repair a mover before touching a console. I think that its just important to understand how it works.

 

[robartsd]

I think that its just important to understand how it works.

While I don't think a designer or programmer has any need to know how to fix the instrument, they should have a basic understanding about how it does what it does. I would hope anyone working in the industry would feel comfortable figuring out how to take the cover off a disconnected instrument sitting on the bench; however, if they haven't been trained in tech, they probably should feel uncomfortable figuring out how to take the cover off an instrument in the air.

 

[photoatdv]

While I don't think a designer or programmer has any need to know how to fix the instrument, they should have a basic understanding about how it does what it does. I would hope anyone working in the industry would feel comfortable figuring out how to take the cover off a disconnected instrument sitting on the bench; however, if they haven't been trained in tech, they probably should feel uncomfortable figuring out how to take the cover off an instrument in the air.

I suppose I should've added in that I do a combination of live events and corporate shows as opposed to theatre (not that I haven't done theatre or won't go back). On my events the LD is the programmer and sometimes the op as well. So the LD pretty much needs to be able do whatever needs to be done onsite.

I guess I should factor in that a theatre LD is rather different than a concert lighting director. But of several LDs I know (a few in corporate, and one who's in USA as an LD), all of them at least know the basics of how a moving light works and 2 could certainly pass as a ML tech (event though they've never done that beyond maintaining fixtures on their shows).

 

[derekleffew]

One of the members mentioned in post#5 above sent me a PM:

I'm in finals week hell and just don't have time to participate right now...

But if I had time to battle the trolls , I would make two general points:

1) Having a degree doesn't mean you actually are endorsed by that school and/or faculty. Someone who coasts through with a low C average is not the same as someone who is really motivated.

2) Programs do exist like ours, which are focused on supporting art and storytelling with technology. We certainly show students networks, moving light parts, etc., but that doesn't mean they retain it . We have a limited time and have to focus on the "big" issues--a lot of the practical stuff is easier for them to get on the job.

 

[facethewolf]

I sympathize with the guy being railed against. If I don't know about moving light maintenance it's not for lack of desire.
I've been out of college for 5 years. I went to the college's "Multimedia Institute" which means I was taught how to be a jack of all trades and a master of none. The focus was on the artistic use of video cameras. We learned a little bit of the technologies behind lighting and video and audio, but a LOT more about the art...Even though I WANTED to learn about every technology I could get my hands on. I DID know more about the lighting system, the multicamera studio system than any of my peers simply because I played around with it after hours.
One of my greatest regrets is that I never got my hands on a moving light to play with.
Also, I left college without learning most of the industry lingo.
It wasn't until after college in a AVL rental house that I learned more about the industry technologies than ever before.

One of my biggest frustrations is that I still can't get my hands on moving lights or a true busking board. Although I can probably at least figure out how to get the cover off.

PS I do not have a fulltime job and now I question the value of my degree more than ever.

 

[chausman]

Not that I'm saying everyone SHOULD take apart a mover, I got to just change a couple gobos in a VL1000 yesterday, and that was very interesting to see the insides of one of them. I doubt that it will change how I program, but it is nice to know those things.