LD at Large

If you are thinking about embarking on a career as a crew member for the Circus of the Sun, let me tell you about my experience, and you can see if you still feel the sunshine.

A good LD lights where the guitarist is supposed to be. A great LD lights where the guitarist is going to be.

I recently moved from Las Vegas to Canada for a number of reasons. One reason for moving is the current political climate in the U.S. Canada has proven to be very polite and rather pleasant. I moved to a small community where my services as a concert lighting director might not be in high demand. Belle River does not have any casinos, convention centers, ballrooms or arenas. But it does have hockey rinks — lots of them.

I’m a firm believer that people who have spent time in the shop have a better understanding of the lighting business than those who have not. I am lucky enough to have spent four knuckle-busting years in the shops of Vari*Lite, Morpheus and Cinelease. I was there to receive hand written shop orders, assemble gear, tech lights and repair rain-drenched VL6s and Mac 2Ks that came back from multiple Olympics from around the globe.

Symmetry is the single most important design aspect when constructing a rig and programming a look for visual impact. Until it isn’t.

How can a pup without a nickname run with the big dogs?

I heard about a tragedy the other day. A designer lost a tour based solely on color selection. A particular band that chooses a different color for each album cover hired this person to do their tour. During a televised promotion for their upcoming tour, the production manager mentioned to the designer/programmer that they would like the color of their album to be in every single song. The designer chose to go against the band’s wishes.

Keeping the Lonesome Road from Dragging You Down

On a long and lonesome highway, east of Omaha… No, I’m not going to read into that Seger song. Karaoke doesn’t start until 8 p.m.

I am well aware that you are more than capable of designing, operating, teching, programming and facilitating every single show that comes through your fine festival grounds. But today, you are my festival lighting designer. I only need a few things from you and I need them done to the best of your ability. I need a patch, a plot and a functional rig. A smile would be nice, but not necessary. I don’t need your résumé nor do I need your sob story. After checking in with a handful of my favorite programmers and directors, I have come up with a comprehensive list of tips on how to help me help you to make our time together as de-light-ful as possible.

Will a theater degree help you to avoid a hard knocks life?

As a proud recipient of a bachelor of fine arts in theater from University of Nevada Las Vegas, I often ask myself if all of the time, money and effort spent obtaining that piece of paper was worth the hardship. Has my ability to differentiate Half C.T. Blue from 708 Cool Lavender ever been a deciding factor in my employment? My education is listed on my résumé, but has an employer or client ever thought to confirm my accreditations?

We need to come up with a solution for all of the elusive fixture profiles that are costing us countless hours of hunting down DMX charts and building our own hacked-together libraries. In the last few months, I have received several emails, text and even Facebook messages asking if I had a fixture profile for everything from a two channel smoke machine to a 48-channel beam wash hybrid fixture. These cries for help are coming from newbies as well as top-level programmers who are scrambling to find the correct profile for the current fixture that needs to be patched immediately so that they can get to programming.