Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater

Thu, 21 Sep 2006

Finally coming down (Part I)

It's over... SketchFest, that is.

For the second year in a row, I was the Tech Director of SketchFest Seattle. It was interesting, stressful, fun, tiring, invigorating, annoying and completely fulfilling.

It all started last year, when I said I'd do it again. But it really all started on Wednesday the 6th. We piled into the Erickson Theatre Off Broadway to get everything set up for the arrival of the first group on Thursday.

My biggest priority was to get the lights and video projector set up. Val (Artistic Director, second board op, generally helpful person) and Rachel (Stage Manager, also generally helpful person) both joined me for the Wednesday setup. I looked over what lights were available, and decided that they were about right as they were. I wanted different gels (color filters) in some of the lights, and I re-aimed a few, but I didn't ultimately do that much to them. The worst part of that was getting to the instruments over the audience.


Audience seats at the Erickson
The audience in the Erickson, as in many theaters, sits on a slope which rises away from the stage, so everyone has a good view. That's great for the audience, but it makes getting to the lights above the audience a bloody nuisance. On top of the aforementioned bloody nuisance, the only ladder which would fit up there safely was this amazing extend-o-ladder. Great ladder (I have already forgotten who makes it, of course), but it must weigh 75 lbs. So I found myself wrestling this incredibly heavy extend-o-ladder between rows of seats, laboring to keep it from opening too far, lest it should lock open. If it locked open, it would be permanently wedged in the seats until I could figure out how to release the pressure on the locking mechanism and unlock it (which is normally supposed to happen as it's lying on the ground). Not, really, the best option as far as ladders go.

However, despite all the odds, I did manage to get the lights gelled and focused, roughly to my satisfaction. The words, "you can change anything you want, but you have to put it back when you're done" kept ringing through my head, discouraging me from doing very much to the lights.

Next, video doom.

Posted at 21:26 permanent link category: /theater

Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater