TTA320 Portfolio
Welcome to my TTA320 Portfolio. In this section, you will find various documents and explanations supporting my process of designing and planning Animal Farm and Blood Wedding for my TTA320 Production Management, Design and Realisation module.
During the module, I worked in two teams, these teams consisted of three second-year and two first-year TTA students, another TTA student and myself were in both of these teams due to us wanting to work on both shows, we worked this out by choosing to do both and having a different main discipline on each show, however, we still helped each other with the different roles wherever we could.
We also worked closely with the acting course and directors to develop the shows. These shows would have been performed the week commencing Monday 27th April however due to the disruption caused by COVID-19 these had to be cancelled and instead we carried on to design the shows online through video meetings etc. We then presented our ideas to the rest of the class to get feedback and constructed a portfolio documenting the process for assessment.
I have included a dropbox to download documents mentioned. You can also click on the images to make them larger and view them in greater detail.
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/frcysdlqngswbxu/AAA5bHrQMRoHE199iXdMudXSa?dl=0
Blood Wedding - Lighting Design
My role in the Blood Wedding show mainly consisted of lighting design. I worked with one of the first-year students on lighting design and programming. The first thing we did was to go to a couple of rehearsals with the cast and director, from this we then created some mood boards with ideas from existing Blood Wedding shows as well as other shows that we thought would work well as inspiration. The top left image is a mood board from my colleague, the other two I produced.
We had just arrived at the point where it was time to start designing the show, however, lockdown then got in the way. Our team kept in contact with each other and the director through the use of email and video meetings through Microsoft Teams. Once I had talked with the director about design ideas I created a WYSIWYG document (from a base document I had created earlier for both shows as it would be easier to have a default document and edit it for each show) I then drew the set that was outlined by the director. These plans can be seen below.
Set and Staging
The light blue coloured objects on the plans above are the staging that has been used. We decided to use a circular platform as the main stage, this is made of four quarters which would have been hired in. The other staging is used for some musicians and is placed at the side of the stage. For set, we used some chairs and microphone stands. The chairs can be moved around by the actors and they can sit on them when they are not in a scene. The microphone stands are functional, holding microphones connected with red XLR cables, this was a design choice from the director. The microphones can be used throughout the piece. In the centre and right-hand plan you can see the green set pieces well, these are white spheres which hang from the roof throughout the space, they catch light from the rig as well as from four birdies around the centre stage.
Lighting
I decided to use fresnels and PC's for the wash lights, these can be seen in green. I then used source fours and PAR 64's as side light from the voms, red and steel gels were used in the sidelights to give a striking and dramatic look when they are used. I chose to have most of the moving lights in corners in order to aid with the wash and give good opportunities to use them for effects and specials. I also added two moving lights in the centre above the stage to give some top-down spotlight. The parnels on the edges of the three centre trusses have a red gel which also helps the looks when using the sidelights. The four parnels on the floor around the centre staging are used to light the spheres in the air. There are also three specials which light up the band and four led pars under the staging in order to light up what would be acting as 'deaths lair'.
I had a meeting with the lighting designer for the show after us so that we could compare our rig designs. This was so that we could accommodate each other and make it easier for the get in/out for each show.
Lighting Programming
My primary role in Blood Wedding was lighting design, one of the first-year students was the programmer and operator. The lockdown caused by COVID-19 made this a difficult experience as the programmer didn't have WYSIWYG to enable them to visualise what they would be programming. To overcome this problem I had created the WYSIWYG file as well as prepared an EOS file with the patch, channel numbers and basic groups etc. I then sent a plot (with channel numbers and gel colours) and the EOS file to the programmer. They then went through the cue sheet and program to the best of their ability and sent the EOS file back to me. I then put it into WYSIWYG and made the relevant edits. We sent this file forwards and backwards many times in order to program the cues for the show. This took a bit of time, however, it worked well. It was a bit difficult to start with as the programmer was dealing with some personal issues so my contact with them was limited, but when they engaged again we worked together well and got the programming done.
Renders
Below are renders taken from what was programmed in WYSIWYG and EOS. I have included a link to a dropbox where you can find these images so they can be viewed at full size/resolution.
Relevant Documentation and Calculations
The image on the top is what I use for my focus notes. I would hand this as well as a lighting plan to the venue technician, it tells them the unit number which corresponds with the position of the fixture on the truss. It then indicates what colour, gobos and accessories are needed for that fixture. It also specifies the purpose and focus position and lastly the patch and channel numbers. This image is for just one truss, I print one truss per page to make it simple to follow.
Below are power and fixture weight calculations, these are also by position. I have included further calculations and documentation which you can look at in a dropbox link.
Animal Farm - Sound Design
My main role in Animal Farm was the sound design, however, I helped a lot on lighting design and programming. I worked closely with one of the first-year students on sound design, I found that we got on really well as a team with good communication and always getting tasks done on time.
The sound design for Animal Farm is quite basic. There are five microphones, one that stays on stage for Mr Jones and four at each offstage corner for the cast to use if they wish. The rest of the audio consists of tracks played from QLab. There is a drummer on stage however this doesn't need to be amplified through that PA as we found that it was plenty loud enough when played over the actors. We decided to use the venues default placements for the speakers to make it easier during the get in, there was also no need for special speaker placements.
On the right is a plan which shows the microphone positions and a QLab file with the tracks in.
Animal Farm - Lighting Design
The lighting designer for Animal Farm doesn't have WYSIWYG, therefore I created one for them. We worked on it together through a Microsoft Teams meeting where I shared my screen so we could both see it. This worked well and I think it was the best way that we could have overcome this problem due to the current circumstances. As I had created the WYSIWYG, I also went through the same process with the first-year student for programming as we did in Blood Wedding. Again this worked well, a little time consuming but once we got into the rhythm of our method we were getting cues programmed well.
Set
On the right are images of some of the set pieces I drew, the gates had already been built before lockdown. I had to draw them in SketchUp so that they could then be added into the WYSIWYG drawing. Before we went to online learning, our team had created a safety checklist for the actors using these gates. It outlined the procedures needed when using the gates as well as the checks that were to be carried out before they were used. The actors then had to name, sign and date this document. The checklist was attached to the gates and would have been removed from them for the shows only.
Renders
Below are renders taken from what was programmed in WYSIWYG and EOS. I have included a link to a dropbox where you can find these images so they can be viewed at full size/resolution. These renders came out quite dark, I think this was partly to do with us having to program remotely with us passing the EOS file back and forth to each other. I edited slightly and even though many fixtures were at 100% some still came out dark. I think if this were done in a real venue, the coverage would be fine as viewing the lighting on WYSIWYG doesn't always give it justice. This would be something to improve on next time.
Other documentation
I have included many more pieces of relevant documentation in the dropbox link provided as I didn't want to clog up the portfolio. There are documents like cue sheets, calculations, plans, extra renders and much more. Everything that I have uploaded to the portfolio and the documentation in the dropbox link is something that I have helped to create and worked towards, for example, the lighting and sound cues in the cue lists for Blood Wedding and Animal Farm respectively would have been created by myself but added to the full cue synopsis by the technical stage manager.
Reflection
Overall I think that this process, at least for the groups I was in, went as well as it could have considering the implications caused by COVID-19. Our teams adapted quickly to working online and supported each other where needed. For me, I saw the working online as a challenge and new experience which we proved to ourselves that we could overcome well. There were a few problems along the way including one of the other teams not putting their documentation on the public Microsoft Teams chat, this made it difficult for the other groups, for example, to compare lighting plans to make it easier for the get in/out by adding in the other team's fixtures to my own plans as we may have had more time to rig them due to our rigging time being on the changeover day. This was resolved by asking them directly for documentation, after this, they then did put their documentation on the public page, which the rest of us were very appreciative of. Another issue we overcame was the first-year student lighting programmer having to miss a few sessions, through no fault of their own. We worked without them for the period they couldn't join us, but when they came back and were able to work they were filled in and helped to catch up with the work. In the end, they produced some really good work which we then went on to use. Other than these few issues I really enjoyed the process and have gained useful knowledge and experience from working online and from the module itself!
I have included a link to a Word document containing a word count for the report on this page.