GridGirl

Controlbooth is effectively the US version of this forum. In terms of stage blood, I’ve always found that makeup artists or prop managers have their own recipes - I used to work with a makeup artist who swore by adding blue tinted dish soap - which also meant it washed out much more easily. Maybe contact some props departments of big opera companies and see if they can help - opera seems to have a lot of stage blood so they’re experts!

Think the loudest peak I’ve seen was 130db(C) some years ago. Actually, that’s the loudest peak from an acoustic musical instrument (it was an absolute unit of a brass shelled Rührtrommel field drum), we did a ballet which had a stockwhip crack which peaked at about 145db(C) until the lash was altered so it couldn’t physically crack that loudly. This is what happens when someone on the ballet staff was a junior stockwhip cracking champion who taught the dancers how to do it properly… Legally we have to keep the LAeq at 85dB(A) over an 8-hour time period (so louder over a 3 hour show).

Still used in small towns with volunteer fire brigades in New Zealand. My parents have a holiday house in one such small town and as kids we got quite accustomed to hearing it go off. Out of interest I’ve just looked it up and they generally attend 70-100 call-outs a year.

This isn’t an official job ad, but Opera Australia is looking for a Head of Lighting and from what I can see, will be accepting international applicants. It’s a reasonable salary even for Sydney’s high cost of living, and I’m probably biased but it’s a good company to work for. As someone who moved to Sydney to take my job up, it’s a beautiful city to live in, and I still don’t get tired of walking around the corner and seeing the Opera House gleaming in the sunshine! All the details at opera.org.au/jobs if you want a change…

I used to work for a large and well known opera company, outside of the UK. We got in automation technology for followspots in about 2017-2018 (can’t remember exactly when). First show they got used on, there was a panic booking of spot ops halfway through the production period when the system just did not work well enough. Since then a different system (BlackTrax, I think) has been introduced and is markedly better - but there are still spot ops on each production, it hasn’t replaced them completely.

So we’ve had apocalyptic rain here on the eastern seaboard of Australia over the last week or so. Concert at a local theatre had the floor give way under the carpet due to piers shifting because of the rain - the carpet held and no one was hurt, luckily.

I don’t know how well it will work with a haze machine - I’ve ducted fog with no issues though. Worth a shot! We always seemed to get the best results with the pipe end a couple of inches away from the machine nozzle, for whatever reason it created better airflow. Flexible plastic piping will be fine, you shouldn’t have an issue with it melting. You’ll just have to experiment to figure out what works best for you. On the odd occasion that we did have the piping in contact with the machine, we just gaffered it on - no need for anything special!

That’s an excellent point. When we had our big refurb in 2017, part of the new pit setup was removable acoustic panels which attach to the ceiling (so we can adjust absorption and reflection according to the work being performed). Obviously, being in the ceiling means we needed a pair of ladders to put them up and remove them and the opera house didn’t skimp. They brought a ladder specialist in, he looked at what we needed to do, the average height of the staff doing the job, where we needed to position the ladders and recommended a particular ladder (with a work platform at the top) for the job. I don’t know what they cost but they were not cheap! However, they’re perfect. Lightweight, easy to move around, exactly the right height for the job, exceptionally stable - I’ve never felt anything but totally safe on them. Worth every penny that was paid. The only problem we have with them is stopping other departments stealing them...luckily the House has a myriad of doors and corners where a lot of people never go, so we found a good (and convenient!) hiding place for them and they’ve remained safely in our possession!

Moderation: Moved topic to the Sound forum. Anna (mods)

Moderation: I’ve moved this topic to the Sound forum which it’s better suited to! Anna (mods)

The Iroquois Theatre fire of 1903 also had a big impact on theatre safety laws (and building fire safety codes as well). Reading about that one always gives me chills because there was so much that went so wrong.

You might have more luck asking over at ControlBooth which is as close as you’ll get to a US equivalent of this forum!

Slightly off topic but still important and on the subject of radio telescopes: I do hope everyone here has seen the film The Dish. It’s centred around the Parkes radio telescope which played a big part in broadcasting pictures from the Apollo 11 moonwalk. Wonderful Australian film - well worth a watch if you haven’t seen it.

Three years ago when the Opera Theatre at the Sydney Opera House was undergoing renovation, there were news headlines screaming about “asbestos found at the Sydney Opera House! Is this iconic building safe?!?!” This, of course, threw our players into a frenzy, thinking that they’d all been exposed to asbestos and so on. We were 99% sure that it was nothing to do with the pit and none of the players had been in any danger (and of course if it’s undisturbed it’s not usually a problem); to try and calm them down we ended up calling the staff member who was our liaison regarding the renos and of course it turned out to be fine. He said that they knew there was asbestos in the building, and that they’d undoubtedly find it during the renos, it was just that they didn’t know exactly where it was - the plans of the building are not very accurate, mostly due to the mid-construction changes that were made. Plans had of course been put in place before the first sledgehammer was swung, it got removed safely, statements were issued basically saying the media had made a mountain out of a molehill and we never heard any more about it. Interestingly enough the Concert Hall renos, which are now about nine months in, haven’t had the same headlines. I do love how musicians overreact and go to DEFCON 5 at 1000 miles an hour though. The last fun one I had to explain was that a 5Ghz wifi router was not the same as a 5G mobile cell. There’s a router in the pit because audio use an iPad connected to the sound desk a lot and without a router in the pit they were having connection problems. Had to get my computer engineer husband to write a plain English explanation of the differences for me that time!

And on a larger scale - just been sent this from Sydney http://postimg.cc/V0y3Htfq https://I.postimg.cc...se-12-11-20.jpg Link isn’t working for me but I’m guessing it’s this one? https://ibb.co/VHnJC5T It’s stunning in person, one of my favourite SOH projections.

My old theatre announced they’d been granted the full amount they’d applied for so I’m delighted for them.

In a twist that I didn’t see coming, a company management job at a theatre pretty near me came up last week. I wasn’t actively looking (I’ve been busy putting university applications in!) but I follow them on Facebook and it popped up in my feed. Pay is pretty similar to what I was on at the opera, commute would be about half what it was, and as it happens in the past we’ve been subscribers of the theatre so I know they do good work. I figured I had nothing to lose and everything to gain, so I’ve put an application in and we’ll see what happens now!

Thanks all - I suspect there will still be some tales from the Opera House to be posted on the forum yet! In all honesty I wouldn’t be surprised to find myself running a theatre company education department in five years’ time or so - it could well be the perfect job for me I suspect...

So I ended up putting in an application for the new role, figuring I had nothing to lose (apparently the redundancy payment would still apply as it wasn’t a redeployment), had an interview on Wednesday...and didn’t get the job. The technical manager said there was almost nothing between us and it was an exceptionally difficult decision to make - I’m not sure if that makes it better or worse! I’m a little disappointed but not overly so - I’ve had plenty of time to get used to the idea of retraining; there will definitely be casual work going (possibly short term contract stuff too) so if I want that, it’s there. Right now I’m glad that a decision has been made an I can start to put plans into place - I’ve decided that going back to university and studying primary teaching is the way ahead for me, and fortunately we’re in the position where I can do that without causing financial strife. They’ve also made 16 players redundant, and that is going down about as well as you might expect; there’s an absolute furore and I’m not altogether upset that I’m well out of it, to be honest...

I’m leaning towards walking away at the moment. The company which returns after this bloody pandemic is not going to look anything like the same as the company that went into it. I don’t know if I want to be part of that, plus the job description reads like a road to burnout, if I’m being honest. If I go and train as a teacher, that’s a job which is never going to disappear due to a pandemic, a world war, or anything really. As I said, I’d have no problems picking up casual work so I can stick around, but it would be much more on my terms. It’s definitely looking like a preferable option right now.

We had all ANZAC Day services/ceremonies/marches scrapped this year for the first time ever. To be fair, we were just coming off the end of lockdown. But there was almost no kickback - instead of the dawn services which are normal, it turned into a nationwide “stand at the end of your driveway at dawn” instead. It just made more sense.

I’d run some distilled water through it to just clear everything out. A good clean is never a bad idea.

It’s just bloody horrible. My colleague and I are good friends and there won’t be any grudges held, but it’s just not nice. I’m doing some serious thinking about a lot of things. This new role is a fixed-term contract, with no mention of what the term is - my gut instinct is that this is where they’re heading in the future and there won’t be any more permanent contracts happening; if things come right and the company is able to begin expanding again, it will be fixed-term contracts only because it limits their liability. I’m seeking some advice, because my reading of the relevant legislation is that if you’re on a fixed-term contract and it comes to an end, you’re not eligible for any redundancy pay - but I’d like to know that for sure, and have an appointment early next week to go over that and a few other queries I have, because employment law is not my area of expertise! It could be that because I was on a permanent contract and then shifted to fixed-term that it may be different, but I just am not sure right now. I also want to know what the term of the contract is. The other thing is that in the new job description, there is mention of casual staff to run shows. We used to do this a lot more, until it got to the point where our admin load was heavy enough that we were able to take on more permanent staff who also had some operational duties. It’s blindingly obvious that whichever of us gets the job (me or my colleague), the very first phone call we make is going to be to the other, to ask if they want casual work. I’ve already spoken to the production manager of the symphony orchestra and he’s put me on his casual list (they’re not doing much right now obviously but there will be work in the future). Right now, taking the redundancy and going back to university (I’d probably retrain as a primary teacher) and then picking up casual shifts with both companies is looking pretty attractive. I’ve been on a reduced wage (government subsidy) since the end of March and we’re getting by without an issue - my husband is still working full time, just from home - so my redundancy would stretch without difficulty as well. I’m not quite ready to leave the industry altogether, but I could easily keep my hand in with casual shifts. Or, there are loads of amdram groups who I’m sure would welcome me. I’m also totally gutted for a young colleague - the one who has only been with us since March last year. It was his first permanent job after leaving university, he moved here for the job, and he was really starting to find his feet and figure himself out as a person, as you do in your early 20s. He’d blossomed massively since starting with us. He’ll get over it, as we all will, but it’s a lot harder to reinvent yourself when you don’t quite know who you are to begin with. I’ve got a lot of thinking, weighing options, discussing with my husband, and considering everything to do. The application for the new job closes the end of next week - I suspect I’ll be putting in an expression of interest regardless, but we’ll see!

Whole team gone (made redundant) bar one - not me. However. The whole organisation has had a massive restructure, and as part of that some old jobs have been combined to create some new roles which take in various responsibilities from parts of the old jobs. These are only being internally advertised to existing staff at the moment (and will remain that way unless they can’t fill the roles internally). One of them is pretty much my existing job minus a few things, plus the addition of surtitles and piano scheduling. There are precisely two of us - me, and my closest colleague, who is also a close friend - who can fill that role. I think I’ve got a slight advantage over her in that it asks for experience with out (stupid) purchasing system, which I have and she does not, but other than that I have no idea how they’re going to make a decision on which of us they give it to. I’m a bit more “tech savvy” than she is as a rule, and I’m also the one who made our sound level prediction spreadsheet a whole lot more efficient and the only one who can go into it and generate a new graph without having to consult the instructions (which I wrote!) at every step. This feels like the Hunger Games and I hate that the two of us are being pitted against each other for the one job. The new job sits under the technical department rather than the artistic department; I’ve got no idea if my three years as a tech and four years as a stage manager will play into that or not. I hate this.

Can you cut a piece out of a hem or similar to see if it burns? Not particularly scientific but might give you an indication of whether you need further inspection on them or not.