I have a tendency to disappear whenever a show is near, and this week was no different. At first I wanted nothing to do with this years musical for various reasons, but after doing the middle school show I changed my mind. As of right now I'm focusing more on the tech side of the show rather than the directing and managing of the show. I'm going to be a design technology major in just 6 months, and there's a lot I want to learn before them.
Luckily I'm pretty close with Russ and during the Wiz he was showing me his designs for the set of the high school show and well theres an actual set. It's not common in our district to have actual sets. Most of our shows are fairly minimal due to budget reasons, so once I found out we would actually be building something I jumped on board. Anything to learn something new right? On saturday we started by building the basic framework of the set. This included a 6 foot platform, the framework for the cubicles and a bunch of tables. Now I don't have much experience with building. the last time I use a hammer was in 8th grade tech class so I was a bit nervous. But Russ started me off with easy jobs like measuring out pieces of wood to drilling pilot holes to using the circular saw to using a jig saw to cut out the portals. I thought I'd be terrible with power tools and end up chopping someones fingers off, but I was actually pretty good at it.
We got the majority of the building done in the first two days and then on third we started painting some basic parts of the set. On the forth day I spent almost my entire day in that auditorium. 2nd period I was painted the tables on top of the portals, 5th Russ and I painted the portals, during STAC we hung them and after school cast insisted on using the stage. So while waiting a few hours to get back to work I painted a wooden cart blue and made a stencil that says mailroom to spray onto it, and man making stencils is a pain in the ass. Once they finally left, we began to hang lights. I was in charge of running all of the wires up and across the walls which is tedious and honestly feels quite dangerous. I knew I wasn't going to fall or anything but I just generally don't like heights much. Russ also taught me about the different kind of lights and how to figure out which one is needed to light up certain parts of the stage. Then I had to untangle a shimmer curtain while Russ connected a pulley rig to the ceiling to hang the curtain. It took me almost an hour to untangle it and another half hour to finish the rig, and by the time we were both done with our tasks we connected it and surprise! it looked terrible. We really tried to make it work, but it just wasn't meant to be. so instead we changed the design a little bit and now we're hanging the shimmer curtain directly off of the elevator and to get some use out of the rig we're hanging a sign off of it to add to the scene. sure it was disappointing, but it taught me how to deal with problems and not get too hung up on one part. At that point it was 8:30 PM and I was absolutely exhausted. I had been up since 6, worked all day and by then I was running on empty. So I sat down with Russ, decided on the rest of the colors, planned for the next day and departed the team at 9 o'clock. When I got home I instantly fell asleep and man I have never been so physically drained. I guess I'll have to get used to it though because this is what college is going to be like. And then guess what happend the next day? I had to get up and do it all again.
While all this work is tiring, I love doing it. I like building things and seeing projects come to life. I've heard countless times that this line of work is unrewarding and techies are under appreciated. And while people always over look all the hard work the tech crew puts into a show and give all the credit to the actors, at the end of the day I know that I am a part of something. As much as we're overlooked, nothing feels better than seeing a show that you know the ins and outs of go up and look fantastic.
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| framework |
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| current status |
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