Teaching The Tech Crew

[michael]

Hi before I start I just want to say that I am a student studying a technical theatre course, my tutor has asked me if I wanted to teach some of the younger tech crew at school some lighting (from year 8 to year 10) I would like to do this but im not sure where to start.

I was thinking of going through some lights such as par cans, source 4s, fresnels and basic equipment and coiling a cable properly.

Any ideas would be appriciated. :up:

[Ynot]

Definitely start with the basics.

Hang a lantern of each type you have available on a couple of T-bars or 2 stands with a 10 ft scaff bar between them.

Cable 'em up to a small dimmer rack and manual desk.

Plug in a smoke and/or haze machine.

Point the lanterns at a plain cyc/wall and demo the differences in the beam shape/quality etc, and show how they can be changed by way of the zoom/shutters/barn doors/focus etc depending on the unit.

Change the angle of projection onto the wall/cyc to show how the beams can change that way.

Have a 'portable' lantern - probably a Par can as it's lightweight and can be easily thrown about a bit - show them side light, front light, top light, up light and back light. If you have the kit, then use various lanterns to combine 2 or 3 of the above and show how to model the actors.

 

Drop some colour in front of each one, including (if you can) some gels which look similar in the swatch, but quite different when in front of a light source. Add different colours to top/side/back light etc to show how THAT can give interesting effects.

 

Pick out some interesting gobos and pop them in turn int the profile. (Or even combine more than one with 2 or more profiles).

Then use a simple breakout in a lantern - possibly one hung in the grid, to show the patterns on the deck.

 

Fire up the smoke/haze and show what that does to the beams and how it can be used to accentuate backlight.

 

Then move on to simple control using the manual desk. Show how it's not essential to have everything at full - sometimes the most effective light is just glowing in the background...

 

Enough to be going on with?

 

EDIT - can you tell I've done a few of these...? B-)

[landy]

EDIT - can you tell I've done a few of these...? :)

 

A little bit!!

 

There are some simple video tutorials on the National Theatre wwweb site which might give you some ideas.

[michael]

Definitely start with the basics.

<snip>

 

Ok thanks, I was thinking of printing a sheet off with the different lights on for them to keep so they can go away and learn it if they want to.

 

Moderation: Edited because it's not necessary to quote a long post in its entirety for a one line reply.

[charl.ie]

Firstly, can I say that I think it's great that you're going to help out teaching people younger than you. I help with a couple of different things, and I certainly find it very rewarding. Teaching others is also a great way to learn yourself.

 

Presuming this is a club thing, rather than an actual lesson, make sure to keep things interesting: I would imagine not many people would come back if you did nothing but coil cables for the entire time. However, these skills are important, so you need to find the balance. You also need to find a good balance between practical work and theory.

 

I find either mini-challenges, or working towards an event, be it real or imaginary, are good things to use. Also see http://www.blue-room.org.uk/index.php?show...c=27938&hl= for some more ideas.

[tommulliner]

When I train up the young kids that come in (come to think of it, I need to train some more up this month!) I first of all defiantly start with the basics and work up, showing them the lights would defiantly be a good start as well as telling them how the whole system works. I’m with Ynot on the fact that the second thing would to be showing them how to use a manual desk and how to use it well and effective.

 

Once they get to grips with the lights themselves, then I would personally introduce colours and gobos and show them where to put them in the light and when a good time to use them would be. Also, something that I wish I was taught!, is to tell them what colours go well together and what kind of effects they product to the audience and the general stage.

 

Also, a good idea would be to teach rigging early on as then they can have lots of practice with you watching them and guiding them so that they aren’t left with just a few tips and left in the air!

 

That my personal view anyways, good luck with the kids,

Tom.

[paulears]

Make it fun, invent a 'game'. put some tape x's on the floor. Get them to focus some lights on these, numbering them 1 to 6, then when you have all 6 or so, write 1 to 6 on some pieces of card and shuffle them. Put one on the desk with the faders marked up.Llights out. With a torch, somebody gives the rest of the group one of the numbers by shouting it out, and the people go to that point - quickly, slowly, individually, and the person on the lighting desk has to snap up the light when they are all there. The op has to push the appropriate fader at the correct time by using their hearing and possibly what they see in almost blackout. Sometimes the light comes up on an empty circle as they forget which bit of tape is which area, or the lights come up on people still getting there. It's all a silly activity, but some people just cannot do it, even with practice. I always did it boys v girls, or worse, dancers v non-dancers. Dancers ALWAYS were better at technical things than non-dancers, no idea why?

[DrummerJonny]

I imagine not many people would come back if you did nothing but coil cables for the entire time.

however, if you show them the correct method to coil cables, then turn it into a race, with points for speed and neatness, its instant fun and a good way to sort a pile of tangled cables!

 

(was working at my old school once and a class came in to watch us setting up the show. I was bored of coiling, and they looked bored so I invented that game...)

[michael]

Make it fun, invent a 'game'. put some tape x's on the floor. Get them to focus some lights on these, numbering them 1 to 6, then when you have all 6 or so, write 1 to 6 on some pieces of card and shuffle them. Put one on the desk with the faders marked up.Llights out. With a torch, somebody gives the rest of the group one of the numbers by shouting it out, and the people go to that point - quickly, slowly, individually, and the person on the lighting desk has to snap up the light when they are all there. The op has to push the appropriate fader at the correct time by using their hearing and possibly what they see in almost blackout. Sometimes the light comes up on an empty circle as they forget which bit of tape is which area, or the lights come up on people still getting there. It's all a silly activity, but some people just cannot do it, even with practice. I always did it boys v girls, or worse, dancers v non-dancers. Dancers ALWAYS were better at technical things than non-dancers, no idea why?

 

OK Thanks everybody...

 

I really like the sound of that Paulears, Thanks :)

[Dodgecaliber]

A little obvious but don't go anywhere near intelligent lighting, media servers, and so on.....

 

If you do, they will just want to get to play with "those cool lights that move"

[TLx]

The ideas are great but bout a little bit about wrking safely and electrical safety?

 

TLx

[TheLightsTech]

Safety is always good. Point out you want 2 points of contact when rigging (I know its a bit OTT for some situations... but we'd rather they have a safety on the light too soon than too late). Ex safety and clamp; hand and safety; clamp and hand; ect. Inexperienced tend to forget :-).

 

I'd say at this point biggest electrical safety one is if you don't know how ask the ME/LD/TD (whoever is competent and responsible for that). When I was LD for a show with a HUGE untrained volunteer crew the "electrical safety" consisted of damaged anything get me or the TD, doing ANYTHING except focus live get me or the TD, fixing anything you MUST have permission from me or the TD, anything else check with me or the TD! ;-) covered all our bases I thing.

[jonathanhill]

I would start with three knots - bowline, sheet bend and clove hitch. Essential and easy to learn. Then start with with all things electric, whilst getting them used to the language.

[paulears]

I'm going to have to disagree here. Safety - both electrical and physical - is NOT a component that should be covered by Michael. With the best intentions, safety can be compromised by incorrect delivery of this subject area. I don't want to get into the age thing again, but this case is different. If you assume that communication is required to make the transfer of knowledge from person A to person B, the the communication needs to be accurate. In almost every case the data will have errors. The successful communicator is able to assess the capability of the receiver to comprehend the data, and in some cases, the data will be simplified to ensure it is received correctly. If you are training university professors in a new subject, it isn't that different from doing the same thing for people with learning difficulties. The obvious differences are in assessing what they can already do, and carrying out the modification. So with the Professors, you could quickly establish their existing strengths and weaknesses and not worry a jot about any maths content, if they are physicists but maybe you'd have to work hard on areas outside of their area of expertise - and you could discover you need to really simplify some areas.

 

In Michael's case, he can't do this. He can easily tell them about safety issues, but will a year X student really understand the importance of a feature told to them by a year X+1 or 2 student? Can we tell if communication was successful? With some people "Volts Jolts, but Mils Kill" would work really well - making the point. With others you'd need to specify the level to trigger V-Fib. See the problem?

 

Safety is too important to be taught poorly. An instruction that all lanterns MUST have a safety chain fitted means little if the person receiving the instruction doesn't understand for themselves why it's so important. Anecdotal evidence, or demonstrations, or....... plenty of ways to do this, but in an unstructured session this can't be done. Somebody who's been trained in educating can use correct techniques and most importantly will have the assessment ability to verify they understand .

 

Imagine one of the kids getting an electric shock and dying a week after being taught about electrical safety. I'm not talking about the legal consequences, I'm talking about what they'd feel like -thinking they did a good job and everyone understood.

 

Michael should look at the entire group, and work out who will get the A* and who will fail. What he does needs to engage both of these different types of people. Does the A* really pay attention, thinking maybe this is all childs play, and how about the 'challenged' one - are they taking anything in at all?

 

Have fun, try lots of things, and make sure the TEACHER handles the safety.

[LukeDR]

The Brit School Production Resource section has some good synopses of a couple of types of lanterns - http://www.brit.croydon.sch.uk/production/..._Recourses.html as well as a good glossary to handout to your students. I have a basic rough syllabus I created for an intense 18 week course to get students ready for a production, PM me your email address if you would like me to send it to you.