BBC Musicals show tonight.

[Ynot]

Firstly, I have no real desire to ask or know what the rig was for tonight's BBC Musicals event at the Palladium - although there have been posts on the Facspace lighting groups of what was used.

But I have to say that the content I watched on TV was IMHO absolutely stunning.

 

OK - with a nod to the LX #1, the amount of kit thrown at this gig was impressive, and the whole premise of having the talent perform to the up-stage wall (and cameras) whilst half the BBC Concert Orchestra and West End backing singers stand in the punters' seats was inspired, but strangely worked.

 

It gave a whole alternative way of getting so many performers into a venue whilst still keeping appropriate spacing.

 

But back at LX - given the scale of the canvas, this was an obvious play-time for the LD and he/she delivered in spades.

I think I saw that Neg Earth were responsible for the show - whoever it was, that was a job well done.

 

It's often easy when given a mass array of kit, to get stuck onto a small number of looks that repeat, despite the availability of such numbers, but this was clearly well thought out and executed. Some very clear and conscious decisions made for both effects and timing to compliment the performers that don't always get made for this type of show, but I'm betting that this is down to the fact that the team had pretty much sod all to do otherwise, so were able to concentrate on analysing the acts through rehearsals and planning one heck of a light show. Subtle when needed and flashy when that was right to do so.

 

My only regret is that because of the demands for TV editors to switch camera views so often we probably didn't get to see the full effect of the designs. But I saw enough to know that it must have been a joy to work on (and one heck of a load-in/load out...!)

 

Oh - the other regret is that there was by default NO audience feedback from the performances cos there was no audience.:(

For them, that must have been hugely depressing, although being able to perform in the first place will have gotten them on a high..

 

But overall, well doe the Beeb...

[sunray]

I saw only a little at the beginning and I have to agree with you.

But I have a gripe at the moment with this and other current shows; why do they have to use so much canned & overloud applause, shouting and screaming? Very blatant on strictly tonight.

[xllx]

But back at LX - given the scale of the canvas, this was an obvious play-time for the LD and he/she delivered in spades.

I think I saw that Neg Earth were responsible for the show - whoever it was, that was a job well done.

 

I haven't managed to see this show yet, but it's on my to do list.

 

The LD was Tim Routledge, and he often works with Neg Earth, so it wouldn't surprise me if they supplied the kit.

[Just Some Bloke]

I totally agree with Tony that the show was great but lacked a live audience. After a showstopper of a performance to have just silence must have been such a come down for the performers and felt very much like an anti-climax to the viewer.

 

Of course, the opposite is to do what sunray speaks of and to add too much canned applause. I'm not sure there is a right way to do it!

[J Pearce]

Some TV shows have done live audience (either via zoom or via fancier SRT/NDI type links) piped back into the room to give response, though that approach isn't without its own issues.

[Ynot]

Some TV shows have done live audience (either via zoom or via fancier SRT/NDI type links) piped back into the room to give response, though that approach isn't without its own issues.

For those that I've seen with supposedly piped applause, including those with the myriad of flat screens in the 'audience' I've usually felt that the responses seem derivative and fake. I can't see that so many households can be completely silent for the duration of a programme except when they're needed to cheer or clap... And combining several dozen/hundred single feeds of applause into what a real audience should sound like strikes me as being rather tricky and unlikely to sound 'right' - so m money is still on the canned applause right through.

 

The LD was Tim Routledge, and he often works with Neg Earth, so it wouldn't surprise me if they supplied the kit.

Yep - that was the guy who was posting answers on that forum and also a grid plan (technician p0rn for the youngsters).

[gareth]

I thought it looked great - with that much kit it would've been easy to overcook things, but Tim kept it just on the right side of the line, and really worked the rig hard to bring the empty space alive at appropriate moments. It was strange at first having no audience reaction at all, but it's surprising how quickly it started to feel normal. I'd much rather it that way than the hyped-up, whooping, hollering, shouty audiences that seem to be the norm these days on light ent shows. I don't doubt that the performers really felt the lack of any audience reaction - it must've been far stranger for them than it was for us watching at home. It also showed the benefits of having an empty theatre available for lots of fit-up, programming and rehearsal time! In more normal times, when something like that recorded at the Palladium would've had to have been in and out within 36 hours to record on a Sunday over the top of the show that was sitting in the theatre at the time, I suspect there wouldn't have been the time to be able to be quite so adventurous and extravagant.

 

Dancing On Ice, on the other hand... not something I'd normally watch, but I caught the bit at the end last night where they run through a little excerpt from each of the routines while voting is going on. With one exception, they seemed to be a lesson in why using all of the LX and video kit all of the time is generally a bad idea! Visually it was a garish, confusing mess. They say "less is more" - well, more is clearly less, too! There's an expression I've heard used to describe firework displays where there's so much product being fired at once that it just overloads the sky into a mess of colour and light - "skypuke". This was the televisual equivalent.

[Ynot]

Of course, the 'Merkins on the fora seem to be salivating over the other big show last night (Superbowl half time) and seem to think that that was the ONLY thing worth watching ...

Though personally it didn't have even a small part of the impact that the Palladium did (for me). OK - different arena (literally) and huge scale of size, but with the amount of $$ thrown at it, I'd have expected something a little more focussed and tidy. Always big challenges when trying to do stuff on that big a scale, but I recall the 2012 Olympics show to be far superior...

[IRW]

It was strange at first having no audience reaction at all, but it's surprising how quickly it started to feel normal.

 

On the contary, I felt the silence spoke volumes. Even in a rehearsal room you'd usually get at least the director clapping madly, if only for timing purposes. By not having any applause, I felt that every number had something missing, so, personally, I think that if it was an artistic decision to have silence, it was inspired, as it highlighted how much a live audience can add to the atmosphere.

 

[ImagineerTom]

Some TV shows have done live audience (either via zoom or via fancier SRT/NDI type links) piped back into the room to give response, though that approach isn't without its own issues.

For those that I've seen with supposedly piped applause, including those with the myriad of flat screens in the 'audience' I've usually felt that the responses seem derivative and fake. I can't see that so many households can be completely silent for the duration of a programme except when they're needed to cheer or clap... And combining several dozen/hundred single feeds of applause into what a real audience should sound like strikes me as being rather tricky and unlikely to sound 'right' - so m money is still on the canned applause right through.

 

The LD was Tim Routledge, and he often works with Neg Earth, so it wouldn't surprise me if they supplied the kit.

Yep - that was the guy who was posting answers on that forum and also a grid plan (technician p0rn for the youngsters).

 

Those shows do record with a live feed from the houses (but with the inevitable 2 second delay) but then as part of the edit they chop out all the silences to improve the flow and also pull out any erratic audio. BGT on the other hand had live viewers but used entirely canned response tracks, any panel show shot at riverside studios has some audience in the room, some watching in the cinema they have in the same building and then mix the two back together in the final edit. Lower budget shows (taskmaster for example) use 100% canned.

[NeilW]

The whole show was recorded over two days at the London Palladium, with lighting and set rigging across the two days before that I believe. We loaded in audio on the morning of the first record day and made our deadline to be ready for soundcheck in just 4 hours which was a pretty mammoth task considering the high input count and monitoring requirements for the socially distanced orchestra and ensemble.

 

We didn't have any off site rehearsals with the artists ahead of the record days. Each artist had approximately a 30 minute slot for their performance on stage with the orchestra, and then we were straight on to to the next one.

 

Hat's off to our lighting colleagues who did a tremendous job - obviously many hours of pre programming ahead of the event and with nothing running to timecode some really skilful operating!

[dje]

The LD was Tim Routledge, and he often works with Neg Earth, so it wouldn't surprise me if they supplied the kit.

 

LD was indeed Tim

Programmer was Tom Young

Gaffer was Keith Duncan

All kit supplied by Neg

[J Pearce]

Tim is a cracking designer and Tom is a great programmer to match. That's a great team!

[sandall]

My only regret is that because of the demands for TV editors to switch camera views so often ........

Don't blame the editors - the constantly-cutting style of direction in LE shows, to give an artificial sense of "pace", came in IIRC in the 80s. I hated it (which is probably why I didn't do a lot of LE), but the current generation of LE directors have never known anything else.

[pscandrett]

The LD was Tim Routledge, and he often works with Neg Earth, so it wouldn't surprise me if they supplied the kit.

Yep - that was the guy who was posting answers on that forum and also a grid plan (technician p0rn for the youngsters).

 

Well, I'm not young any more(!) but I'd be interested in seeing it - but I can't find it on any of the groups I'm a member of (and the FB search is terrible). Can you give me a link to it please? Which group was it? Thanks!