Stage lighting advice

[Jivemaster]

Please help us with some measured dimensions! I'm unable to produce a good impression of the building. If the room is 8ft high where does the stage get headroom? Flat floor?

Please work out how the system will be operated, and by whom. A professional lighting tech will operate a DMX lighting board easily, but other people cannot be expected to use a DMX controller and the system will be useless and probably damaged by unskilled hands. In my opinion (only!) a lighting desk that is a computer is unsuitable for a village or community hall unless you have a permanent operator. 

[sunray]

3 minutes ago, Jivemaster said:

Please help us with some measured dimensions! I'm unable to produce a good impression of the building. If the room is 8ft high where does the stage get headroom? Flat floor?

Please work out how the system will be operated, and by whom. A professional lighting tech will operate a DMX lighting board easily, but other people cannot be expected to use a DMX controller and the system will be useless and probably damaged by unskilled hands. In my opinion (only!) a lighting desk that is a computer is unsuitable for a village or community hall unless you have a permanent operator. 

All good advice.

 

I knew of one venue who upgraded from a junior8 to a very basic DMX desk then mounted it in a cabinet such that the parts of the desk that didn't need touching for manual busking were covered

 

And even that didn't make it workable for Joe Public.

[Jivemaster]

Modern lighting desks are a friendly to a novice as an old computer running Algol with a punch card reader with some creased 80 character cards.

[DorsetGuy]

12 hours ago, Jivemaster said:

For an application where many users will need the stage lights avoid DMX totally unless you are certain to have a tech op staff available at all times. Grandad can run a light switch -even a row of them! BUT if they have to be individually addressed by data you cannot rely on users to leave it working.

I thinking of installing a small 6 channel mini DMX controller that is easy to operate - even for Grandad !!  When I want to operate the lights for our Am Dram productions from my Stagemaster 48 channel deck I can simply swap the DMX cable connection over.  There's no way I'd let some of our other hall users loose on our Stagemaster  !!!   I dread to think what the reaction would be if I was try to explain the workings of it to octagarians Ethel and Gladys from the WI  

 

[DorsetGuy]

56 minutes ago, sunray said:

All good advice.

 

I knew of one venue who upgraded from a junior8 to a very basic DMX desk then mounted it in a cabinet such that the parts of the desk that didn't need touching for manual busking were covered

 

And even that didn't make it workable for Joe Public.

 I was thinking of installing a small 6 channel mini DMX controller that is easy to operate - even for Grandad !!  When I want to operate the lights for our Am Dram productions from my Stagemaster 48 channel deck I can simply swap the DMX cable connection over.  There's no way I'd let some of our other hall users loose on our Stagemaster  !!!   I dread to think what the reaction would be if I was try to explain the workings of it to octagarians Ethel and Gladys from the WI  

[DorsetGuy]

12 hours ago, sunray said:

How on earth do they manage to play badminton in 8ft? IIRC the net is 5ft 6" high.

As others have said it's gonna be too hard to hang lights in 8ft.

Do you have a raised stage?

The main part of the hall is where they play badminton and that ceiling height is a lot higher  - although low enough to interfere with their playing if I was to hang any lights on my lighting bar in the main hall area. This is a pain because, as has been stated by other replies to this post, just lighting directly above the stage won't illuminate faces particulary well. Extra lighting from the front would be best.  The raised stage area is completely separate and although I said it was 8 feet high, I stupidly guessed at this. Should have "done the job properly" and actually measured it !!  Will do that next time I'm up there, but it's more likely to be about 12 foot high.  However, I do have two ceiling lighting bars in the main hall area to the side just in front of the stage which could be used and wouldn't interfere with the badminton players. Any lights on those bars would lluminate the stage from the sides.

[sandall]

19 minutes ago, DorsetGuy said:

 I do have two ceiling lighting bars in the main hall area to the side just in front of the stage which could be used and wouldn't interfere with the badminton players. Any lights on those bars would lluminate the stage from the sides.

Sounds like problem solved, but DO use proper theatre lights that can give an even field, not PARs or cheap disco lights.

[Dave m]

Some of the spaces that I worked in had chilli preset dimmers that gave a number of idiot proof settings.

probably out of budget but allowed a random user to hit a button to “command” a state, from fluorescents to houselights and DBO.

[Gerry]

Yes it is possible, just.

Height from stage to ceiling is 8 ft 6 inches.

The lights are are minims.

Gerry

[alistermorton]

Just as an aside, we have some elumen8 mp75 lanterns which are RGBW fresnels, about the size of a minim, and can be useful in tight corners. I wouldn't use them for FOH general cover, but they're somewhere around the brightness of a 300-500W fixture, depending on colour. Worth looking at as they're relatively cheap, too. 

[DorsetGuy]

On 4/14/2022 at 11:52 AM, kerry davies said:

From the sublime to the gorblimey? Eight feet is the height of my ceilings and I can touch them, you can't hang anything from that, it is way too risky and I am even more confused at playing badminton in somewhere like my living room. Can't be done.

Take a step back and try to get things right but I am generally of the same opinion as Jivemaster, general purpose theatre fixtures will be more value and more use than "disco" lights. I personally like the flexibility of stands especially for community use where they might end up in a marquee on the village green or illuminating a mayoral speech outside the local school. Keep it portable. 

Got any photos of your village hall, that might help.

E2A. I know I can come across as a miserable old scrote but in life I am very positive and well above glass half full. In work however, which to me this subject is, I was paid to seek out the worst possible scenario then prevent it. I am sure that there are solutions to your questions but I think you need to define the parameters a lot more precisely. Apologies if I seem negative. 

I've now attached photos and measurements of our Community Hall.

The central lighting bar in the main hall area can only be used for when we have our drama productions as at all other times the badminton club moan and groan about having lights and cables hanging down - the ceiling height is low. However, I could use the two side lighting bars as these are outside of the badminton court area and any lights mounted on these could light the stage from the front at an angle. Whilst I was thinking of lighting the stage area mainly from directly above, I think it would probably be beneficial to have the stage lit from the front as well, (using the side bars).??    

[sandall]

As someone has gone to the trouble of installing FoH bars in perfectly sensible places it seems perverse not to use all three, but if you just want a bit of front light for other users of the stage (& don't feel up to fighting the badminton brigade), a couple of 650W (or LED equivalent) fresnels on each side bar would do the job.

E2A: By the way, don't knock the old. I have a 90-year old friend who is still a competent sound & lighting designer.

Edited April 22, 2022 by sandall

[Junior8]

On dear every design sin of the typical mixed use hall committed here. But the job can be done quite nicely from the side bars inded at these angles I'd avoid direct front lighting anyway.  (This is a reminder of just how useful - and neat - the old Strand swivel arm wall brackets were.) In the old days I'd have suggested half a dozen 123s three on each side but as Sandall says  any 650 fresnel or similar would do. Unless dimmers are really required for this use I'd try and find some way of simply using switches.

Edited April 23, 2022 by Junior8

[sunray]

Are those 13A sockets in the ceiling for stage lighting and how are they fed?

[sunray]

1 hour ago, Junior8 said:

On dear every design sin of the typical mixed use hall committed here. But the job can be done quite nicely from the side bars inded at these angles I'd avoid direct front lighting anyway.  (This is a reminder of just how useful - and neat - the old Strand swivel arm wall brackets were.) In the old days I'd have suggested half a dozen 123s three on each side but as Sandall says  any 650 fresnel or similar would do. Unless dimmers are really required for this use I'd try and find some way of simply using switches.

I'm not quite sure why you describe as design sins, As I see it this is a nice installation for a community hall and position of lighting bars not too untypical of many theatres, albeit on a different scale and relative positions.

In my local church hall I was reluctantly permitted to install this each side of a 30ft wide hall 12ft from proc and even this is bigger than permission granted

 

Using existing holes in the tiles

Having 4m each side in a village/church/community hall is pure luxury as far as I'm concerned. Certainly beats this junble:

And talking of 650w fresnels all those (and more) microspot 308's and Strand 23's are up for grabs.

Edited April 23, 2022 by sunray