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Lights and Sound
 Community Theater Green Room Discussion Board :Producing Theater :Lights and Sound
Message Icon Topic: ... and God said, "Let there be light."(Topic Closed Topic Closed) Post Reply Post New Topic
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Nanette
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bullet Topic: ... and God said, "Let there be light."
    Posted: 1/21/07 at 8:02am

Until we can find our own, we've been using a church for our rehearsal/performance space.  On top of the usual problems, our biggest challenge is lighting.  Presently, we have lighting from directly above that we can turn on or off ... nothing inbetween.  These are not stage lights, but simple everyday lights.  We don't want to turn on the house lights during the show to get more light on the faces of the actors, for obvious reasons, and would like to know how other CT's handle this problem.  Any suggestions would help.  Thanks.

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TimW
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bullet Posted: 1/21/07 at 11:18am
You could get some PAR fixtures and power suplies like DJ's would use for party's. The size of the stage would decide what fixture and what wattage. I would't use more than a 500 watt bulb. You culd put up a truss to hand them from, or mount them on a base for footlights. They would be lightweight and easy to transport.
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Gaafa
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bullet Posted: 1/21/07 at 7:42pm
As Tim suggested a lighting tree parcan rig is cheap enough with some form of dimmer control & is very  effective.
You will possibly find a lot of unused lighting equipment in your community, especialy that was used for rock’n roll groups or disco set ups.
It doesn’t have to be actual theatre lighting as Industrail, commercial & domestic lighting can be used or adapted.
Have a scrounge around Salvage Yards & even lighting stores or wharehouses, as a good source of equipment.
Possibly the best thing to do first is find an interested person, as your lighting techie.
Or at least some one who understands ‘Ohms Law’ & safe electrical standards &/or practices. [I realise in the US there is no requirement to have a Licensed techie/lighting operator, as we have to have here.] However if you can get a qualified sparky on board all the better, even just an electronics enthusiast can be of great help to the group.
{as most Techies & Sparkies here may have come to understand that it is not electricity that flows thru the cables, that is actually SMOKE {Spectral Manifestation Of Emf [Voltage]} that operates equipment, which is proved when a piece of equipment starts leaking smoke, it invariably stops working!
Also become friendly with the you local Pro venues. Especially one you might know is updating their lighting equipment & tender for any of the old gear they may want to trade in or chuck out. Skip or bin diving in their back yard can be very rewarding, especially for used colour Gel & old bits of electrical & lighting gear.
In a lot of cases when a venue is upgrading their equipment, the supply company of the new kit tend to smash up the old equipment & throw it on the local tip.
Try & get in before they do & buy it off them.
Shop window display lighting is a good cheap source, such as the dichroic spot lights that are used as domestic track lighting can be used as well, especially as footlights [floats] mounted & controlled individually on a wooden board.
Besides all the latest intelligent moving lights available in theatre these days, there are still only 3 basic types of theatre lamps/lanterns, such as ‘Profile’ [hard edge] ‘Fresnel’ [Soft edge] & ‘Flood; lighting. The basic difference are a the Profile & Fresnel have lens & the floods don’t. With the Profile you focus by moving the lens  the  Fresnel you move the light source [globe/bubble] to & away from the lens.
The cheap outside patio lights flood lights are useful as well, even to make up your own ‘Ground row’ [scoop] battens & the like.
Check your local community rag or put an advert in the church newsletter for any old lighting equipment or even for a Techie to assist in cobbling together a lighting rig.

      Joe
Western Gondawandaland
turn right @ Perth.
Hear the light & see the sound.
Toi Toi Toi Chookas {{"chook [chicken] it is"}
May you always play
to a full house}

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Nanette
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bullet Posted: 1/21/07 at 10:40pm
Gaafa ... you're a peach!  Is there anything you haven't done?!  Seriously, though, I live in a town of less than 500 people so I don't think I'll find any rock and roll bands or pro venues who are updating their equipment!  LOL  I will go, however, with the suggestion of asking around.  Perhaps a local contractor will know an electrician who'd like to help us out.
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jdlewallen
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bullet Posted: 1/21/07 at 11:27pm
Originally posted by Gaafa

...
{as most Techies & Sparkies here may have come to understand that it is not electricity that flows thru the cables, that is actually SMOKE {Spectral Manifestation Of Emf [Voltage]} that operates equipment, which is proved when a piece of equipment starts leaking smoke, it invariably stops working!
....


LOLLOLLOLLOLROFLMAO!!!

That's freakin' GREAT!!!!  Will definitely have to remember that one!!



"Every theatre is an insane asylum..." ---Franz Schalk (1863-1931)
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Gaafa
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bullet Posted: 1/22/07 at 2:25am
G'donya Nannette.
The only thing I have not done in theatre is to make any brass out of it & draw the line at windows cleaning,
So all in all after a few days short of  60 years - I’m a  right old failure! Although I could be older, as I have a feeling I was a few years premature & just didn’t front up on cue - but that’s another story.
With the electrical theory this is something which I realised when I was about 9 or 10 having made up a series of home made ‘Salt Water’ Dimmers & a tin can  lighting rig, from used food & ingredient tin cans for my back yard shed theatre, copying the larger salt water dimmers I had worked in the dungeon of the Grand Theatre on Tyneside in the North East of England.
However the smoke theory was formulated & developed further by Joseph Lucas on his web site:-
http://www.peizhang.com/forfun/forfun_writings_smoke.htm
My theatre electric rig was quite spectacular.
Although I was never quite sure what all the fuss was all about at the time? The power in the area was back on within a few minutes!
Anyhow back to your lighting problem even in a small town, by fossicking about bit, especially at Industrial waste locations or building refurbishment sites. You can pick up a lot of discarded gear, even at the local municipal rubbish tip or Council Works Depot with old lighting, cable & electrical fittings.
Or make up your own lights using proprietary brand electrical parts from your local hardware store.
One bush town I made up 8 flood units, each with  4 light fittings in individual cells on separate circuits. That could be used as ground rows, side or over head [Ray] lighting battens. They could be used a separate 4 light units or plugged up into one long unit. I used two lengths of ordinary house rain guttering, joined together to make a trough. Divided it off in separate cell compartments using flat sheet steal cut pieces, just pop riveted in place. Fitting ceramic ES lamp  bases in each cell & ducting the electric’s on the outside of the base behind each lamp fittings. Running septate circuits with a male & female plug tops on each end/circuit, which was used to link units together or use separately on their own.
I added mounting bracket to take hanging C clamps & crossed wires on the front of each cell to take & retain the colour gels - cheap & easy. I think I worked it out at the time to cost only about $11/cell + the globe.
That was 20 years ago & they are still being used at the theatre in that town today!
So with a little bit of help you can have a good lighting rig, not a very pretty - but it works in theatre.
However in all cases get any equipment that is made up or used in theatre tested by a qualified electrician before using it &/or ‘Portable Appliance Tested’ regularly.

      Joe
Western Gondawandaland
turn right @ Perth.
Hear the light & see the sound.
Toi Toi Toi Chookas {{"chook [chicken] it is"}
May you always play
to a full house}

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