Now and then, outside of my "bread and butter" role as the world's finest tech writer and world's worst fly-fisherman, I get the opportunity to venture outside of the corporate vacuum – out where the crews work. This wonderful perk has taken me to Rascal Flatts concerts, The Who concerts, Reba McIntyre concerts and many more – to meet the crews and write about how the creative LDs and set designers put their video tools to work. So, when the opportunity arose to attend a recent Alice in Chains concert, my first reaction was naturally – "Thanks, but no thanks. I don't know these guys' music," I pleaded, "and I'll be deaf for months with terminal tinnitus. Besides, why can't you send me to a nice symphony or something?"
Too late, my fate was sealed. So off I went to the gorgeous (and completely re-modeled) Fox Theater in Oakland, Calif., for a single night whistle-stop along the 2010 Alice in Chains tour. My host was Marty Postma, the tour's lighting and video director, and an LD with extensive credits that include Neil Young's 2009 tour.
Just after sound check, Marty and I spoke at length about the set design, and specifically, what it's like working with a smaller, more intimate set. He also demonstrated how video content could be used to completely alter a confined space. Of course, just when I was getting used to huge arena gigs, along comes this cozy little theatre show – and instead of hundreds of points of rigging, there were six – four upstage and two downstage. Instead of 30 truss motors, there were four – and instead of 22 truckloads of gear, only two were required.
The set itself was unique in many respects. Mike Baldassari, the tour's production designer, worked closely with the band to create an environment in which most of the set pieces doubled as projection surfaces. These included several layers of drapes surrounding the stage and mesh scrims in front of the amplifiers, completely hiding them.
Using DL.2 and DL.3 fixtures from Barco/High End Systems, all tied into an Axon media server, Postma was able to combine each unit's lighting, projection and camera features – and literally paint the set with video content tailored to the mood of each song. Add to that the versatility of the Cyberlight 2.0, also from High End, and Postma had an array of high-output moving-mirror type fixtures that could actually track the talent – and this definitely got my attention.
"Mike (Baldassari) talked extensively with Sean Kinney, the band's drummer and resident visual guy," explained Postma. "The ideas for the set were Sean's, but soon after, it was my job to make it all happen. We had to translate his ideas not only into something we could afford, but something that we could move every day."
Postma explained that, conceptually, the entire show was a gradual progression from an open stage to a closed-in set, in which the band ended up surrounded by video imagery and projection. "We start with a wide open stage," explained Postma, "and you can even see the back wall of the theater. A few songs into the set, we drop drapes and project onto them with the DLs and conventional lighting. As the set progresses, we drop in more drapes behind, so that it closes in the stage and surrounds the band. It's all done very theatrically, but at the same time, it's a rock show, not a Broadway musical. There are also times that we map video content directly onto the band members instead of a projection surface, and use the DL as a digital spotlight."
The video content was dark, saturated and almost medieval in nature – essentially matching the band's genre. "We're up to eight gigs of custom content," said Postma, "all created by Matt Hale. His primary job is creating and building video games, but he's got major touring credits with his imagination on the content side."
Postma was also able to use the DLs' on-board camera systems for I-Mag. Using a matrix comprised of three D-Tek camera switching systems, he could route any of the DL cameras to any of the DL projectors, along with the set's hidden ice cube and lipstick cameras. "The DLs are used for both projecting and imaging," explained Postma, "not necessarily at the same time, but you can get some pretty cool effects. I can pan, tilt, and zoom from the Wholehog 3 (lighting console), with independent focus and zoom of the camera, separate from the projector. The limitation is that where the camera aims, that's where the projector points unless I cross-route with the D-Tek."
Another hidden benefit of the on-board cameras dealt specifically with alignment. "When you're doing these huge collages of multiple DL images into one, if you're not in a good spot to see your alignments, you can simply look at the camera output from that DL, and essentially, you're looking at a dead-on shot," he noted.
I have limited experience with moving-mirror fixtures, so I asked Postma to explain how the Cyberlight tracks the band members. "First of all, you don't have the inertia of a moving head, so the mirror moves a lot faster, and it's a completely different quality of movement that doesn't look or feel like a traditional light," he said.
"We have four Cyberlight 2.0 units up in the truss, and they're hooked into a Wybron AutoPilot system," explained Postma. "It all works via infrared tracking. The guys wear a tiny belt pack that has a little infrared transmitter dot, and we have the receivers up in the truss. The belt pack could be placed anywhere, but since we're dealing with rock and roll performers, we put it on their guitar straps. There are also two packs for each musician, so that when they change guitars, the techs swap the packs to the next guitar," he said.
"The challenge is the rock ‘n' roll environment itself," continued Postma. "Other fixtures simply don't move fast enough to track the performers, but the mirror speed on the Cyber is critical to being able to work with these guys. They can run all over the stage, and the system keeps up. I mean, the guys were having fun in rehearsals trying to outrun the light, and they couldn't.
"Another interesting benefit of the Cyberlight is that when you hang it sideways as we have, it fits a lot tighter into the truss, and doesn't hang as low as some of the moving heads," he said. "This means that you gain two to three feet of clean, usable projection surface in the back, which is valuable real estate for a show of this nature."
Postma also had high praise for the band. "I have to say, working with everybody here, the band is very personable," commented Postma. "They go out of their way to make sure that everybody on the crew is well taken care of, and they create a very relaxed atmosphere for everyone."
Before the show, my plan was to take a few photos and scoot home after three or four songs. After meeting Marty, and watching how the show unfolded, I stayed around for the entire gig, simply waiting to see what creative magic he'd pull for the next song. The heck with tinnitus, this was way too much fun.
CREW
Production & Lighting Designer: Mike Baldassari
Lighting and Video Director: Martin Postma
Head Lighting Technician: Petey Hulin (Christie Lites)
Custom Video Content: Matt Hale
Lighting Vendor: Christie Lites
Production Manager: Gary Chrosniak
Tour Manager: Chuck Randall
GEAR (Partial List)
Console: Flying Pig Systems Wholehog 3 console with DP-8000 processor
3 High End Systems DL.3 Digital Luminaires with wide lenses
1 High End Systems DL.2 Digital Luminaire
4 Cyberlight 2.0
1 Wybron AutoPilot tracking system
4 High End Systems Showbeam 2.5s
4 High End Systems Studio Command 700s
3 D-Tek video switchers
