[SML] lighting for video (from a live theatre background)

Tue May 26 22:43:21 UTC 2020

Hi Dorian

(It’s great to see the same people still here and active!)

60’ wide stage, 25’ wide cove.  6 lamps in the cove fanning out to cover. (so straight in @ 90deg perpendicular to the stage, lamps are at the centre of the room, pointing outwards L and R for the 1 and 6 areas).

There are catwalk sides 1 floor down.  What you gain by losing altitude you lose by moving closer to stage.
3 lamps per side.  They do a Left/Centre/Right wash with 19 and 14deg lenses.  House hang is with a light lav on one side and a light pink on the other.  Pulling gel and running open white (with frost) is an option.  I need to play with levels to make the near shot and far shot equal intensity.  Also the near shots are (a little bit) under a “Royal Box” or Juliet box of audience seating.

But even here, the 19deg don’t have enough punch by themselves, but the 14 deg is too concentrated.  I considered ETC zooms looong time ago for the position, but that would only work on one catwalk where you could reach the zoom controls without reaching around to the far side of the barrel.  If I add a heavier frost (R119 or R114) the intensity drops too much (in my mind, need to get a light meter and confer with camera crew.  (already lamped with 750w)

There is a followspot booth on center, but only 20’ wide (give or take).  Only 2 dimmers, but with DMX I can do something in there (same height as the catwalk sides).  It’s been an idea to put a key-klamp ladder in there for years, but it would kill the use the followspots.

A truss mid room is interesting.  Depends on where it needs to go, how it blocks audience sight lines from upper balcony (it will if it’s at a preferable / usable angle).  Then how to get the ladder to it and hide the ladder when in show mode . . ..   all the fun considerations that Artistic types don’t like (seeing ladders, seeing cable swags, seeing a TRUSS IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROOM OMG!)

2 short truss sticks L and R perpendicular from the catwalk sides (or just below) may start to look interesting . .. . . .

1 question is:  if I frost stuff out, and flare spills all over the maple wood and concrete architecture, how much of that will fade away in the camera wide shots and a) be OK, b) be horrible c) be present or d) be “dark”.

Thanks everyone.

Andrew M. Riter
Chan Centre

604-808-2033 (working from home)

From: Stagecraft <stagecraft-bounces at theatrical.net> On Behalf Of Illuminati500 via Stagecraft
Sent: Tuesday, May 26, 2020 2:39 PM
To: Stagecraft Mailing List <stagecraft at theatrical.net>
Cc: Illuminati500 <illuminati500 at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [SML] lighting for video (from a live theatre background)

How are the cove luminaires focussed? If the are at 90 degrees to the stage there will be problems as you describe. . If you are focussing them as crossing pairs of profile /fresnel soft fill, the problem will be much less as there is an effectively longer throw and you get the bonus of facial modelling. Is there any capacity to under fly the cove with  an advance bar at a better height and width?
Dorian Kelly
Illuminati  Arts

On 26 May 2020, at 1:54 pm, Stephen Litterst via Stagecraft <stagecraft at theatrical.net<mailto:stagecraft at theatrical.net>> wrote:

On May 25, 2020, at 1:17 PM, Riter, Andrew via Stagecraft <stagecraft at theatrical.net<mailto:stagecraft at theatrical.net>> wrote:

The Front light for the 60’ apron is from 1 front of house cove (25’ wide) at a very high angle.  So High I need to fill in under the eyebrows with lower side lighting.  The apron is covered by (6) 10deg S4 with lots of overlap.
|  o(    )o(    )o(    )o(    )o(    )o  |
Basically the edge of lamp is almost at the hotspot of the next.  Anyone walking across is pretty blippy (bright dark bright).  It’s noticeable to the eye, but I’m afraid of it looking worse on video.

First off, go with DV’s suggestion of bench focusing those 10 degrees.  Getting a good, flat field will do you a world of good.

You don’t say what the throw distance is for your FOH cove.  In a large concert hall, I feel like 6 - 10 degrees isn’t enough for a 60’ apron.  In my medium-sized theater I have that many washing the front of my 36’ stage.  Can you try an experiment with adding in more 10 degrees to see if you can even out some of your blips?

Steve L

Stephen Litterst
ETCP - Certified Entertainment Electrician
slitterst at gmail.com<mailto:slitterst at gmail.com>

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