Getting closer to tech week. Here is student lighting designer Nick doing some focussing as construction continues behind him.
Even though the university did not have classes on Friday, our TD, Steve, still had a work call to push forward. The pipes got added and the set now really begins to look like the drawings. . .
As the brick facing gets painted, it gets put back on the structure. This is one side of the gatehouse section.
Keri, Rasell, and Mike work on truss pieces that will form header pieces between the vertical perimeter structures. Mike is the student assistant TD on this show.
One of my painting projects for the afternoon was to start painting the vertical perimeter pieces.
Alyssa works on the poison bottle. The director has asked that it light up from within, so she and Keri have been devising a way to attach an LED to the base of the bottle.
Finally, the end of the day. That’s our TD, Steve, off to the side. Much facing has been reattached, and you can see all the vertical perimeter pieces that still need to get painted leaning up against the back wall. The horrible post-installation realization was that some of the masonite floor/facing pieces that I painted weren’t actually meant to be concrete, but wood. Ah, the importance of labeling.
The brickening continues. After basing some facing, Casey spent the rest of the afternoon painting mortar lines.
And here is Dennis and Abigail priming one of the vertical truss pieces, while Jayson takes a break from the light hang to hang out with them.
This is what Jayson was doing moments before. Allison’s on the ladder circuiting, while Cassandra pauses and poses for the camera.
Of course, while that’s going on, I take a break from painting to head off to the first production meeting for our first Fall show, “Come Back.” Here’s my sketch pad with the director’s preliminary notes and some doodles.
With “Dancescapes” done, the set has been moved into the Barnett. The units have been relocated and the forestage addition is in process of being built.
In the shop, now that I’ve finished the stained glass, I am turning my attention to the brickwork. There was some confusion with the mixture of fieldstone and brick panels. At first, our TD thought that it would be a one to one swap out — anything that was light brick would become fieldstone. After I said that I would like all the the columns to be brick, regardless of color, what got painted what became more complicated. Add to the issue the labeling mishaps when the facing was removed from the units, and we’re probably not as far along as I would like to be. Oh well.
In the Design II seminar, we’re turnign charcoal light renderings into no-color looks in the light lab. Here, Keri and Joe set up one of Joe’s looks. Since the Design II seminar has more time to spend on activities like this, I decided to spend some of that time focusing on value and distribution (thus the charcoal). Consensus among the students was that they wished we had done the black and white version in Intro to Design and saved color for this class. Looks like I will be revising the lighting section of Intro to Design this Fall!
This is the look we built from Joe’s sketch. We’re using Tony Kushner’s short play “Reverse Transcription.” This is the look just after the moon has been switched on by one of the characters.
In the previous session, we built one of Keri’s looks — this time before the moon is turned on. I think Thad’s phone takes better photos than my camera.
Work on “Romeo and Juliet” continues.
Here is Erik, deeply engaged in the brickening. . .
. . . and here is the stained glass, now finished and sitting and waiting to dry and cure over night. . .
. . . meanwhile, in the Hicklen, the facening continues. Now that Dancescapes is over, we can move the set over to the Barnett. The facing has been stripped off the stage right unit and is awaiting painting, while in this photo, Thad and Molly finish up the facing for the stage left unit.
Finally, in the Design II seminar today, we took charcoal lighting sketches of Tony Kushner’s “Reverse Transcription” and put them up on their feet in the light lab. Here is the realization of Keri’s opening look.
There is a lot of iron fencing on the set. This is the piece that Tybalt gets impaled upon.
Further progress on my stained glass project. At the end of the afternoon I had one side done. Now I have to flip them over, lead that side, wait for that to cure, and then see if I need to add texture and color to make sure it doesn’t look like plexiglass colored on one side.
In Hicklin, facing continues. . .
As well as adding a small platformed area so Juliet doesn’t plunge into the void as she’s silhouetted against the stained glass.
Finally, Jayson rises from the dead.
Oh wait, there’s more — we’ve started in on the summer’s shows. Here are my first doodles for “Muskie Love.”
Further progress on my project. The first piece of stained glass is filled in on one side, and the second piece is fully leaded on one side.
In the Hicklin, Molly and Thad continue working on facing.
Tomorrow afternoon, the bottom of one unit should be completely faced, at which point we will pop it off and I will begin painting it.
“Romeo and Juliet” continues as “Dancescapes” goes into technical rehearsals. This is my current afternoon project; creating the two stained glass pieces. Above, I’m in the process of laying the first one out. . .
. . . and here it is, further along, with some of the leading applied. Once the leading is completed,I’ll fill in the glass, then flip it over and apply leading to the backside as well, since it will be seen from both sides as the unit rotates.
Meanwhile, in the Hicklin, TA Thad sizes facing on the units. There was a mishap — our TD bought out all the brick paneling from one Menard’s, and when he went to a second one, he grabbed what he thought was brick — just tan brick as opposed to red brick (we’re painting it all anyway, so color didn’t matter). Turns out he grabbed feildstone, rather than brick. Looks like the units will have some fieldstone sections and some brick sections. . .
As light hang for “Dancescapes” continues in the Barnett. . .
. . . construction of “Romeo and Juliet” is in full swing in the Hicklin. TD Steve Chene talks to students Eric, Quinn, Bruce, and Joe about putting washers on carriage bolts as the platforms are bolted together. Since rehearsals are in the black box theatre, it made the most sense to build in there so the actors (and director, and choreographer) have as much time as possible playing with the pivot units in their various configurations. When “Dancescapes” is over, the units will break apart and be rolled over to the Barnett.
Here’s a better view of the stage right unit, as TA Keri staples things.
Intro to Tech students Liz and Samantha work on measuring and cutting facing.
And now that the model has moved into rehearsal, I get to clean off my drafting table and use it for. . . well, “Muskie Love” and “Corpse” are coming up as our summer shows. Or perhaps I’ll just go back to piling my course materials on it.
My sad little model is complete enough to send off to rehearsal as soon as the glue dries. . .