I’m already in Bristol for the next gig with English National Ballet this is Young Culture Circus Festival last weekend.
Just finished the 1st sketch of this years Sorin Sirkus show. This year I’m doing the sets as well. Now it’s time to dig into reality and adjust all the measures since they are building parts of the set in 2 weeks!!!
Just got back from Lyon. It was third move of Tero Saarinen’s Next Of Kin and there was already some routine and we had the luxury of two setup days so things were not as bad as they could have been.
The challenge was that the stage opening was over 17m. Because of sight lines we were able to reduce it only to 14m or so. The depth of stage was not greater accordingly but was even smaller than in London. The cinemascope did justice for the piece visually but caused problems with the famous scrim because we had to spread the 10 quick release magnets to 14m. The opening in Helsinki was 9m…
All above is peace of cake compared to the fact that this was the first gig where I was in charge of the lights. The piece changed quite dramatically in Helsinki and also we used Robe instead of Vari*Lite. Now we were back in Vari*Lite but there was not much to clone. Mikki used the ballast strobe and animation disc in almost every cue. And of course because of hectic sessions before the premiere and in Helsinki the programming was a mess. Can’t blame Mikki - I got my part of the programming-timecode-show-live-thing.
The days in Vilnius before the premiere were insane. Still there should have been someone to clean the programming always after rehearsals. After 12h none of us were not up to it. I should have cleaned the show more in Helsinki before I started in Lyon. Or just explore a bit more how it was programmed. Well now the programming makes little bit more sense to me. Maybe I will book some ESP Vision studio time and do it again before next tour and redo everything.
After all the outcome was not bad. And everything was very smooth with great crew of the Biennale.
Jarmo standing by behind the curtain.
The famous sync/backup rack that almost works.
Lyon: the stomach of France. Waiting for another entrecote.
Jarmo grooving in ridiculously expensive jazz bar.
BTW You will not find show photos from here except of my own designs. To see photos of the show, check www.terosaarinen.com or www.flickr.com/photos/terosaarinen/
1st week of Next of Kin down - two to go. Finally learned to run the show (I think there are about 5 cues that are not in time code). Most of the time at Alexander theater we have been designing the foh sound rack - a final version of the playback system. We will stick to ProTools and back it up with a hard drive multitrack recorder. The actual rack has been ordered but all the equipment is still waiting for final approval from the economic department. The case should be in freight to Lyon in two weeks… But I’m not worried. We’ll get all the stuff we need in time. Actually I have so much trust to the economics that I pre-ordered a Grand MA2 Light to get into reprogramming old shows first thing in January. It’s finally good bye to the SparkTop.
Also been trying to forward the changes to Lyon… It will be fourth setup of the show and rider version 12.5, I think.
The first week of NOK ended with nice party @ Jarmo’s villa. Great food and live music. What more you can ask for!
Finally got the equipment and some of the crew (there are still open vacancies that you can apply) to a youth circus festival sorted. Now working on the puzzle of scheduling +100 performances inside three days.
Here’s how the main stage is going to look like: LEDs, Mac 250 washes and some infamous VL1000AS
I set up Tero Saarinen’s “Could You Take Some Of My Weight” for Norrdans in Härnösand. It was one of the easiest gigs forever. Thanks to good crew there and also for Mikki for designing very simple lights. The piece was set on the first day we started to work and programmed the next. Got few full rehearsals and I think that’s it. I think I’m obligated to go back there for the premiere but not too much work anymore.
Tero’s “Next of Kin” opened in Helsinki yesterday. That was not an easy setup. We did’nt have any major technical problems and won the London crew by 5 hours (even when we were outnumbered compared to those lucky union workers).
The hardest thing was that since Tero wanted to change some things and the moving lights were replaced with different type we wanted to give Mikki some extra programming time. So we started on Monday morning at 6 a.m. The plan was to give stage to Mikki at 4 p.m. I think it was around 6 when he got into programming. 16+ hour days are never fun. And since we are on our home stage even I had to get my hands dirty which is definitely not fun for an office rat like me.
Next of Kin is developping technical wise too. Besides new moving lights, new quick release system for the scrim and new midi sync we have gone to version 2.0 with our Robe follow spots!
Ville on SL spot is very pleased to loose the gloves, Marco on SR is not happy with the added tail weight. I think this is not the final product still.
Sorry about the bad image quality. It’s an iPod, Phone and a Revolutionary Internet Device, not a camera…
Edit: In Mikki’s blog you see how to convert Robe ColorSpot 1200 AT (this time 700) to a follow spot. See the post here
Back at the office. I have to say that I could have used couple more weeks of holiday. Also having some starting problems since the first week is all at the office.
Next week I’m off to Sweden, Norrdans to help them stage one of Tero’s pieces licensed there. It seems to be more and more gigs like this witch I like because this is much less stressful than touring (if you don’t count the haze issues in Gothenburg Opera last season).
Not too much touring before Christmas. 3 week season in Helsinki and short trips to USA and France.
At the circus front there are not many new shows. Of course the annual Sori show and then there is a youth circus festival in Tampere. The organizers (us at Circus Ruska) are expecting some 600 performers and 100+ performances. I’ll be your LD and PM for that event.
In general the Autumn looks good. Not too much work, but I’ll survive and have time for my old hobby: I’ve started juggling again. If you don’t believe me - come to see me @ Tampere International Theater Festival. I do street shows there Fri-Sun at Tullikamarinaukio.
Turin is done. Guess how well the Italians were able to stick to the cuelist? Not so well. And of course Marco Melchior, my Italian contact, friend and the PM of the event, said couple of times: This is the cuelist and we follow it so go ahead and program a cuelist. Sometimes during the show no one knew what’s happening and it didn’t help that I don’t speak Italian.
When working on a single cuelist you prepare the console little different from working live… Still, I survived and there were not too much stuff in the programmer at the same time. It actually looked pretty good at some points but I don’t have photos of those moments because those were the rock parts and I had my fingers on flash buttons ; )
While we had bad luck with the weather (well not actually that bad since it didn’t rain during the show), I had really good luck in taxi on my way to the airport. There was cash dispenser next to my hotel but I was too tired to get cash for the taxi when heading back to the hotel after the show around 01:30 a.m. So I decided to grab some cash in the morning when my taxi arrives at 05:00 a.m. Of course the machine didn’t work and the taxi does not take cards in Italy. I sit in the cab and the driver does not speak English (surprise). As we head to the airport I think that there must be a dispenser at the airport. For some reason I start to count my coins on the way to the airport. Combined with the few bills I my wallet I had 37€. Te taxi cost 36.70€ and there were no cash dispensers at the airport!
This is it for the season. I’m off for holiday until the beginning of August. Then it’s coming up: Norrdans, Sweden
This month has not been great for my motorcycling in Finland. Rain every day. And what happens when I fly to Turin to make an open air event… Thunder storm!
As you could imagine, the Italians are not that prepared for heavy rain during setup. The dimmers were in a middle of a lake after the rain. But no problem, everything worked after the sunset and after the rain. Well, some patch issues but those were solved as fast as you can at 2 a.m. I also have some cues already programmed for tomorrow!
It is quite different to make open air gigs in here where the sun actually sets and it’s dark. The not so nice thing is that you can only work at night - at home it just doesn’t matter.
Image: Check the surroundings!
And the not so important part:
8 VL3000 Spot
8 VL3500 Spot
24 StudioColor
12 SGM Giotto Spot 400 (Go Italy)
4 8-moles
4 4-moles
8 2-moles
8 2kW fresnels
6 650W Fresnels
12 Profiles
12 PAR64
Grand MA Light
As some other blogs are publishing images of ongoing design works I just have to follow. Here are some rough sketches of a concert stage in Torino in the end of this month.
A colleague of mine once asked why I always have to have something hanging down from the rig. The answer is I don’t know - I just have to.
The equipment will be:
24 StudioColors
18 VL 3500 Spots
16 MAC 250
and some conventionals
