Simon Sidi is a well-respected lighting designer, but he’s made a mess of his latest tour — on purpose. After handling the design of the American Idols Live tour for a long time, he went away to pursue other projects. But now he’s back as the production designer and he brought with him some fresh ideas.
During his time away from the AI camp, Sidi designed the lighting for the recent Annie Lennox tour as well for the tour for So You Think You Can Dance in the U.S., Canada and Australia. He also tour manages and produces the Dance tour all over the world. For the Idols tour, Sidi works directly for 19 Touring, which is part of 19 Management, who handle the artists.
Keeping It Clean
Sidi’s involvement with the current tour as production designer includes lighting, set and video design. After speaking to the show director about what he wanted to do with the show and the general makeup of the show, he set out with a goal that was a little different this time around.
“My brief was to keep it clean,” Sidi said. “It is a very minimal looking stage set.”
He was given a free hand in the concept and arrived at a final design after some negotiation.
“There is always a back and forth,” he said. “That’s the nature of the job; you always have to compromise. However, if you have a good understanding of the budget and the truck space available you should be able to design a practical system. The only barrier is one’s imagination.”
More Than Meets the Eye
Sidi modeled the design with lighting design and animation software and then put together a few renders to show the team and explain the concept. Fortunately everyone liked the design on paper. But achieving the design was more complex than one might think.
“I wanted it to look messy in the rig and clean on the stage,” Sidi explained. “The lighting trusses are all mangled together, all twisted and mixed up. Messy is very interesting to achieve; it’s not as simple as it looks. You have to spend a lot of time making it look random. You can’t just throw it together. I wanted it to look messy from all angles in the arena. Using a combination of Vectorworks and 3D Studio Max, I was able to look at the design from the point of view of the audience and create great looking renders.”
To aid in creating the “messy” look of the truss, Sidi relied on technology and physics.
“Thomas Engineering made a new type of universal joint so that the trusses could be built on the stage,” he said. “We then attach the motors and let gravity do the work. Getting the trusses in the right place is simple as long as the motors are in the right place. All the trusses are straight; it just looks twisted when you see it. I apologized to the crew boss Marty Langley for the design before he started working on the project,” Sidi said with his tongue firmly planted in cheek.
Spreading the Love
Most of the stage is flat with the exception of a one-foot high riser for the band. The band riser runs the width of the stage and is 12 feet deep. The stage has a wide thrust with a lift built in for entrances and exits. The main stage has three sets of steps at the back and one on either side just upstage of the thrust. The flooring is a speckled gray.
“I spread the band all over the stage,” Sidi said, “and wanted them to play as a band as if in rehearsals. I wanted a relaxed band who felt at home on the stage. I wanted to get away from the predictable ramps, steps and levels.”
To set the tone and liven up the set, seven different-sized mirror balls hang on a truss at different heights. When it flies in, the atmosphere changes. Downstage of the front trusses a series of bubble machines are flown on truss. A V-shaped truss with a double “silver slate brilliance” kabuki hangs mid-stage, ready to reveal the winner of Idol, who has his own section of the show. Under the stage, smoke machines pump out billows of fog and low smoke machines under the riser lay down a thick blanket, propelled by fans built into the stage.
“The hardest bits were the low smoke and bubbles,” Sidi said. “I must have gone to see a number of different demonstrations of machines and ways of creating the effect I wanted. It seemed to take up all my time for a while. But I loved it and I learned a great deal from the ‘old-timers’ in the film effects business.”
A Little Help, Please
Sidi specified Vari*Lite Series 3000 Spots and Wash fixtures for automated lighting in the rig and Martin MAC 2000 XBs for upstage floor lighting. Martin StageBar LEDs light the trusses.
“I wanted to use Super Cycs, but no one will let me use them anymore,” Sidi said. “Please, someone build another better version of the Super Cyc.
“The winner of the show and the runner up have large chunks of the show to themselves,” Sidi added, “so I have kept certain gags for them like the drape and the low smoke. The rest of the show is based on the songs and the performances. I always try to hold back and not let all the guns off at the same time.”
The Big Picture
Sidi wanted the video to be a major part of the show. He said the video display screens needed to be “large, very large,” and he wanted the ability to split them up. Jason Varner was hired to coordinate the video and Raj Kapoor designed most of the video content and it was built especially for the display configuration.
“Simon called me and told me about his idea for the Idols Live 09 tour,” Varner said. “The video setup was to be five (LSI Industries) V-Lite walls that could all be mapped to a single source or PiP’ed individually. Megan’s song, ‘Tears Dry on their Own,’ is particularly awesome, with supplemental video content created by Nick Militello.”
Sidi’s vision was for the video content to move from screen to screen while retaining the ability to put I-Mag on any or all of the screens as well. So Varner created a pixel map and loaded all the content into a single HD template so they wouldn’t have to worry about syncing multiple sources.
“Technically, it’s a relatively simple setup,” Varner said. The content is delivered as Apple ProRes 422 video format in 1080p and it is stored on Doremi V1-HDs. Playback is controlled by Medialon Manager running off of timecode from the MD, because all of the music and sound effects for the show opener and Idol introductions are live, so the playback has to be frame-accurate. All of the video sources end up in a Barco Encore where I-Mag gets PiP’ed and content is mapped 1:1 and sent out to a Saco processor that controls the five V-Lite walls.
Making an “Amazing” Show
Sidi and lighting programmer/director David “Fuji” Convertino spent a week at Centerstaging pre-programming the show using a PreLight system. “It was invaluable,” Sidi said. “The Idols were rehearsing in the next room and we could watch a performance and then go and work out looks and colors. David has done a spectacular job programming this show I’m very proud of it. I used the best video programmer in the business, Jason Varner, to put the video sections and timecodes together, which makes for an amazing show.”
Epic Productions is supplying the lighting, Nocturne is supplying the video and the staging was supplied by All Access Staging and Productions. “I’ve worked with all the vendors for the tours and I love working with them,” Sidi said. “They do a great job and always give 110 percent. But a tour is only as good as its crew; their hard work makes the show. The crews are amazing and work so hard.
“I have not seen the show yet,” Sidi added. “I’m in Australia with the So You Think You Can Dance tour and have not yet seen an Idol show. I have done the rehearsals but had to fly out before the first show, so I cannot wait to see it. You are all seeing it before me!”
Nevertheless, Sidi is happy to have made a full circle with the Idols Live tour. “I’ve designed three other Idol shows in the past,” he said, “and it is wonderful to be asked back.”
CREW
Lighting/Video/Set Design: Simon Sidi, 19 Touring
Lighting Director/Programmer: David “Fuji” Convertino
Lighting Crew Chief: Marty Langley
Lighting Company: Epic Productions (Kevin Forster, account rep)
Dimmers: Kevin Cassidy
Moving Light Techs: Jason Taylor, Blake Rogers
Producer/Director: Raj Kapoor
Video Director: Nick Keiser
Video Coordinator: Jason Varner
Additional Video Creative: Nick Militello
Video Company: Nocturne Video (Bob Brigham, Account Rep)
Staging: All Access Staging and Productions (Robert Achlimbari, account rep)
Stage Manager: Steve Nimmer
Production Manager: Graham Holmes
Tour Manager: Jessica Roncker
Tour Publicist: Leila Eminson
Trusses: Thomas Engineering
GEAR
46 Vari*Lite VL 3000 Spots
16 Vari*Lite VL3500 Wash Fixtures
10 Martin MAC 2000 Wash XB Fixtures
15 Martin Stagebar LED Fixtures
32 Coemar PARLite LED Fixtures
8 Martin Atomic 3K Stobes
2 MA Lighting GrandMA Lighting Consoles
