Tech Theatre Tinkerer

Lighting technician and designer, electronics hobbyist and freelancer. I love theatre and classical music. In Sydney, Aus.

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Previews down: 1

Fire truck call-outs: 1

[darksideofthecurtain]

Gotta love a truckbed full of old lights

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Man, SLs were a great fixture. I suppose their heyday is over now you can’t really get globes or spare parts.

The bayonet detented lamp base, super easy to replace one-handed and hard to fuck up (unlike Pacifics). The big zoom range in a small package at decent enough quality, with knobs that don’t get too hot. The lettered and numbered lens sliders so you can notate a focus! The asymmetrical yoke mount so swapping short-/long-yoking only takes a moment to flip it. The 360° rotating body for shutter shots. Gel frame clips better than most others.

The absolute workhorse of rep opera here.

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I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it on this blog before, but I’m practically aphantasic.

It seems like it must be pretty rare to be a lighting designer who can’t picture scenes in their mind…

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It’s really good to LD this show again but in a new way. I love colour.

Romeo & Juliet 2022

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Hi, I’m currently trying to use touchosc with the last version of eos but I failed, can you help me please? Thanks, Nico from France

Never tried to use OSC so I can't really help you out there. I know someone else in techblr has done a bunch with it... Maybe it was @opposite-prompt

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Feel free to message me, I have designed a bunch of TouchOSC layouts for Eos

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Pipes are back up

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Wow, interesting, that’s super weird rigging to my eye. All the fly bars I’ve seen round here are rectangular pipe not round, and I’ve never seen anything flown on wrapped chains here before — it’s either on proper welded brackets to permanent bars, or wrapped with gack slings (the ones with steel wires inside). Some smaller flown bars I have seen with short sections of chain and locking carabiners for leveling adjustment rather than turnbuckles or threaded interfaces, but never wrapped chain.

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What 60 head blocks, 520 loft blocks and appropriate cables look like on the way to the metal recyclers

[stagemanagerssaygo]

Walking through props storage, alone, in the dark

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This, except wardrobe storage instead. Have you ever been in a room covered with metre-deep clothing racks on every wall and dozens more crammed into the space to leave only tiny aisles to squeeze through, brushing past every jacket and dress?

Did you know that it forms the basis of an anechoic chamber, and is so unnatural a scenario that your ears feel like they’re being pressed on because your brain doesn’t know how to process the complete lack of echoes or background noise? That you can literally scream in there, and there’s so much fabric that the sound is sucked up into nothingness until someone standing at the door *three metres away* can’t hear you at all?

[lightsandsoundgo]

Throwback to when I'd lead build calls with crews comprised partially of actors, and the gays would show up in stunning outfits like

You look beautiful but you're about to get covered in sawdust and paint so I'm questioning your choices

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I’ve had someone show up in two-inch acrylic nails and heeled sandals.

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Romeo and Juliet opened the other day. It has been amazing being lighting designer on my first play. And working outdoors in a heritage venue has been challenging but very rewarding.

Technical deets: no hanging positions outdoors means all footlights, sidelights and practicals. 12 hexpar 12 equivalents, with 4 on US & balcony wall wash (next year hope to purchase some pixbars for walls). 7 as sidelights due to uneven stage shape, and 1 as special for side of building (the church). 17 dimmed channels including 5 par56s, 4 footlight boards of 3-4 150W QIs, 40 globe festoon string, and the rest in 300W QIs around the place. Colour palette: L136, L501, L711, L603, L206, L205, L204, L795, L244 (first four in gels & LEDs, remaining only in LEDs).

(Photographer: Seiya Taguchi)

2nd universe going through a custom pixel controller box to control 450 pixels hidden in a rope hanging across stage, for star effect in a few spots. (Below: testing the pixel string and half of festoons)

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Remembering the good times, more than eight months ago now, yeesh.

[q2qcomics-deactivated20200929]

Q2Q Comics #535: Exactly Why It Won’t Work

[tdldproblems-deactivated2021080]

My Associate Production Manager found this old dinosaur in his office as he was cleaning it out.

[col-brightside]

“Man the optics of this lamp are really bad what’s going on??”

…. The things you find at maintenance. #lxblr #lightingDesign #techblr #techtheater #techtheatre https://www.instagram.com/p/B–GztrjoRq/?igshid=1ajoaoj566mzu

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It’s always better to be the person who asks “hey remind me what lamp type goes in a source four?” than the one who does this. That must have been pretty funny though.

[techie-problems]

this post if 4 U to reblog telling us about your production, showing us the set, showing elaborate SM notes, prop tables, etc (actors, show us your work too!!!!!) if your show has been cancelled/ postponed by COVID 19.

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Here's the stage area of the design for the Othello that wasn't.

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So I was meant to be relighting a show but the old LD dropped off the face of the earth and left no documentation, and the producer said fuck him guess what you're designing a new show now. I have a week until the one week of rehearsals. 2 days for bump in and tech? In a venue I don't know. Does anybody have a paper bag handy Jesus pushbiking christ

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Welp, the show's cancelled anyway. Hopefully we will be able to bring it back in October as planned. We're all in this together, theatre folks. Look after each other and yourselves and stay home ❤

[opposite-prompt]

So I was meant to be relighting a show but the old LD dropped off the face of the earth and left no documentation, and the producer said fuck him guess what you're designing a new show now. I have a week until the one week of rehearsals. 2 days for bump in and tech? In a venue I don't know. Does anybody have a paper bag handy Jesus pushbiking christ

[lightingblossom]

Hey techblr, can I get some help? I'm doing inventory of my theater's supplies and I found this lamp. I don't know what unit it goes to and I can't seem to find anything online. Can anyone tell me?

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According to this https://www.controlbooth.com/threads/lamp-questions.83/ , it’s for a Colortran Zoom fixture, (and possibly other colortran models)!

Lamp Questions

Since I'm here, I might offer any help I can give with questions on lamps. I'm kind of rated as an expert on the question of them in the pr