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Belfast Opera House


strand600X

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Hi Everyone,

 

I am trying to get the tech spec for Belfast Opera House. More speciffacly the lighting FOH so I can draw up a WYG plan does anyone know where or what the lights are. I have looked omn their website but nothing there.

 

Cheers

 

Baz ;)

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well - you're in luck because that's where I am now!

 

Being a Matcham theatre, front of house lighting positions are really poor. There are no circle bars of any kind. at the moment we have a short temporary bar hung that is supporting two Robe 700 series movers, and either side, at roof height are two unrated 5m bars that have 5 profiles on each - and that's about all they can take. There is a vertical pros boom 500mm audience side with some more, plus a cluster of PARs on an ugly, and view restrictive box position. There is nothing rigged permanently, as positions are limited - but there's power to do whatever you want. The LD for this show had 20 or more lanterns on the circle front edge bar, but discovered it didn't actually exisit, so had a rethink on site. Follow spots are RJs right up in the Gods - and don't cover very well upstage.

 

P

anne is off long term sick, and helen leatham is the person you want, but she's not in either!

 

http://www.eastanglianradio.com/goh1.jpg

 

http://www.eastanglianradio.com/goh2.jpg

 

http://www.eastanglianradio.com/goh3.jpg

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To be honest - I'm pretty miffed. I got up, found a camera, put some new batteries in it, turned on the auditorium lighting, took 3 pics, resized them, ftp'd them, and explained that there are NO PERMANENT FOH POSITIONS - for goodness sake, I'm working there and was up to 4am in production week trying to help the crew and LD attach doughty clamps to anything we could. On your wyg plan (release 10?) you have two 5 m bars - you can see them in the photos, along with the other places we managed to attach things. Your plan cannot be generic - here they rig both FOH and stage to whatever the visiting people want, using often repeated 'bodges' to squeeze both LX and sound kit in.

 

I could tell you what is hanging now - but that won't help you when I've gone and the next team move in. I have been up to the Gods, and taken a close up of what is there - I could tell you what they are, but I assume you can work it out - I have also taken two more of the bodged booms and others - all clearly showing what is CURRENTLY hanging, but will all be going out again on the 20th!

 

http://www.eastanglianradio.com/goh4.jpg

 

http://www.eastanglianradio.com/goh5.jpg

 

http://www.eastanglianradio.com/goh6.jpg

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Im sorry I did not mean to offend anyone.

The pics are very clear and Thank you for taking the time and trouble to do it.

Once again Gareth you have been no help whatsoever.

I would like to thank everyone for their help.

 

Baz

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Wow Paul, that looks like quite a job you had on your hands there!!

 

It's a pity such a beautiful venue has such poor rigging positions, but then, I guess it's very difficult for the two to go hand in hand.

 

 

Sorry to hijack the thread slightly, but what's it like on stage? It looks like the sort of place like one of my locals which is still hemp flying. (Though this is on a much larger scale obviously).

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Backstage is fine. Power everywhere, decent height grid, loads of lines at 200mm or therabouts centres, proper flys and loading galleries. Original rake removed, with decent get-in access, big dressing rooms. A 500i for control, plenty of cue lights. Lighting box in the Gods with limited view upstage. Sound provision FOH poor, as the desk is under a very low circle overhang making it offset to one side, and can only see (and hear) up to about 3m above stage level. Over the years the original 2000 odd seats have been removed and now hover just above half that. Very big pit with elevator. Plenty of wing space - all in all quite nice, and a nice house team.
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Once again Gareth you have been no help whatsoever.

Perhaps not directly helpful - but Paul went out of his way to answer your question, including actually posting photos that clarified what he was saying, and I was just pointing out a rather important point in his response which you seemed to have either overlooked or ignored. If you choose to construe that as being unhelpful - well, that's up to you. I'm not going to lose any sleep over it.

 

As to the question of what it's like onstage - the answer is that it's far better than you might think, given Paul's tales of gloom regarding FOH positions! It's a counterweight house, and is capable of handling big no.1 tours. Last time I was there was pre-refurbishment (the tech department lived in portacabins out the back), and I'm led to believe that the backstage areas are much nicer now that the refurb has taken place.

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