Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater
Mon, 25 Sep 2006
Oooh, I just saw that the video intros from this year's SketchFest Seattle are available on the SketchFest website. Download 'em now while they're still fresh! Congrats to Josh for creating some quality introductory video.
Posted at 21:22 permanent link category: /theater
Finding a projector (Part III)
The next day, Thursday (we're following the saga of SketchFest Seattle, see previous theater journal entries), started early. I was freaked out about that projector. I had promised the groups coming that we would have at least rudimentary video available.
Even so, I sent an email out to everyone that morning (entitled "Video doom") explaining what was going on. I got a couple of sympathetic emails, one half-smarmy, "you should really test this kind of thing sooner than the day before the festival" email, and a half-frantic call from the group which was planning on utilizing video heavily for their show. Believe me, if there were any way to test this kind of thing sooner, it would have been done. You organize and set up all technical aspects of a major two-week comedy festival, and get back to me when it goes off without any problems.
Anyway, I knew the day was a total loss to work, so I called up my boss. He was sympathetic, and let me take the day off. I immediately started burning up the phone line, calling around to see who would rent us a projector, and for how much.
Obviously, the really cheap rate we'd gotten from the other theater company was out. No way we'd see that matched anywhere. I ended up calling 4 different rental houses (well, 5, but only four of them had projectors to rent). Between them, we quickly reached a consensus on what was needed: a Sanyo XP55 or XP56 projector, with a custom lens. Sound cheap? Nope, it wasn't.
One place said, "well, normally it'd be $500 per day, but because you need the special lens, we have to charge $150 per day for that extra." I did the math in my head real quick, and came up with a jaw-dropping $3900, before tax. I apologized, and explained that we just didn't have that kind of money. The next place I called wanted $500 per day, and $125 per day for the lens. The next only wanted $450 and $150 (I had been warned that they were horribly expensive, so I was surprised when they came in so cheap -- I was also horrified when I realized that I was now considering $3600 "cheap").
The last place I talked to, A/V Pro, finally said, "look, why don't you call up your money guy and figure out how much you can actually spend. We can fudge numbers on the equipment, but not on labor. So if you do your own labor, we have a lot of latittude." I averred that our budget was going to be a paltry fraction of the lowest price I'd heard so far, but called the money man anyway.
After suitable consultation with the exotic, multi-headed deities of financial mathematics, he called me back and named a figure which was, indeed, far below the figures thus far named. I called A/V Pro back, and repeated the figure, like a man about to be hanged names his final request. To my absolute incredulity, the voice on the other end of the connection immediately said, "oh, we can do the whole rental for thus amount," naming a figure $200 lower than the one I'd just said. (Pardon my vagueness, I don't know the etiquette surrounding discussions of budget numbers -- suffice to say that we were working with an amount which was barely a noticeable fraction of the $3600 price of entry.) I had a moment of stunned silence. "Are you sure?" "Yes, I'm sure. If you want to spend another $100, you can keep it between weekends." "Done!" I practically barked. I paused a moment, and said again, as if in a dream, "we're talking about two weekends, six performances here, right?" "Yep. You can pick it up today," and we were into mundane details.
Amazing.
So I ended up heading down to A/V Pro within the hour, to retrieve the suddenly-affordable video projector (if you were wondering, list price on an XP55 projector is $9995, who knows how much the lens would cost). It came in a big road case, which I loaded into the sidecar after a brief exchange of happy words. It was also while I was down at the shop that I got the call from the video-heavy group, so I was able to pass along word that the video situation was resolved.
Whew, thank god that was solved.
I headed up to the theater, to set up my new prize. It worked exactly as it was supposed to (I'd given my picture and screen specs to the shop so they could pick the right lens). I guess renting something for far less than the going rate is still better than not renting it at all. A valuable lesson to keep in mind.
Teching the groups
At this point, I started running the tech sessions for each of the groups. I won't go into much detail on the individual techs, since they were all about the same thing.
Each group was given 60 minutes for their tech rehearsal. During that time, we had to set up light cues in the board (which was programmable, so once it was all set up, you just hit the GO button to switch between cues; very slick), set sound levels, and do anything else which they needed done. This is standard fare for a travelling show, but the groups' readiness for the process varied considerably.
Some groups came in with excellent scripts, fully annotated and ready for me to use. Others came in with marginal scripts. Others came in with my recommended "tech sheet" format, listing a few lines before each cue, then the description of the cue. No one came in unprepared, which was nice.
Probably the biggest variable in getting each group set up was their ability to convey to me what they wanted. Some had a dedicated tech liason, who worked with me more or less constantly to get light looks and sound levels set. Some groups ended up making lighting decisions (like, where should light cues occur?) on the spot. We managed to get through all of them, but for some of the groups it was a struggle.
Opening the Fest
Techs out of the way, I got myself out of the theater for a spot of dinner. Tech rehearsals had started at 4, but I'd been going all day, getting the video projector situation squared away. There's a great restaurant just down from the theater, called Honey Hole. They make delicious sandwiches. One in particular, the El Guapo, prompts me to think I've finally found a sandwich to displace the fabulous Vegetarischer Croque from Eden (a bar which I hear has gone out of business) in Hamburg, Germany. Good thing, too: Honey Hole is a lot closer.
7 pm and then 8 pm rolled around, and the Festival was on. Honestly, the rest of the Festival is something of a blur at this point. There were no groups which stood out as particularly excellent, although there are moments which stand out. Dusty Warren's "All American Push-Up Party," as he stood there in character, uncomfortably explaining his bed-wetting while his hands treaded water of their own will, and he winced away from imagined sharks. A Mark Twain sketch in which we switch back and forth between East Coast dandies discussing his work, and Twain himself providing lurid and lascivious counterpoint. Two elephants looking at paintings in a museum, discussing elephantine stereotypes. Two Vikings dancing an elaborate choreography to Talking Heads' "Burning Down the House". It was an excellent set of shows.
Posted at 21:17 permanent link category: /theater
After I got the lights set up at the Erickson, for SketchFest Seattle '06, it was time to set up the video.
Through a connection on our staff, another theater was willing to rent us their video projector for what amounted to a length of string and some empty bottles from the last party. It was perhaps not the ideal projector, but for the price, we'd make it work somehow!
The Cyc (white) and scrim (black, in front of cyc) at the Erickson |
So the screen was put in place, and we marked its location so I wouldn't have to re-aim the projector every time. I leapt up the stairs to the booth and fired up the projector.
Hmm.
That... that won't work.
The image was considerably larger than the screen. I adjusted the limited zoom control on the projector to no avail. The smallest setting left 40% of the image spilling off the screen.
Well... shit.
I briefly flirted with the idea of shooting the image on the fabric at the back of the stage (which is called a "cyc," short for cyclorama). However, there was a scrim (like very tightly woven fishnet) in front of it, which rendered the image this awful confusion of moire patterns when seen from anywhere which wasn't directly in line with the projector (ie, everywhere). In addition to that weirdness, the image was too big, the top 10% being cut off. Argh!
We ran through options, but none of them made much sense. Put the projector in the audience (to get it closer)? Too dangerous from a cord-tripping standpoint, and we wouldn't be able to control it. Hang it from the lighting grid? Again, no control, and we didn't have cords long enough. Rear projection? Well, maybe, but we'd have to get it off the stage at the same time as the screen, requiring yet another person to help out.
That projector looked like it was out. Aaaand we'd already been through all the reasonable options for getting another one.
I made a few tense phone calls, just in case any of the options we'd explored might have changed. Nope. Crap!
I did what I could that night to finish up, mostly getting microphones set up, and making sure all the equipment we had was playing correctly through the sound system. It was, but I was seriously bummed about the video situation.
Posted at 16:03 permanent link category: /theater
Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater