stormdog: (Kira)
2015-01-04 04:57 pm
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Lights Again!

My favorite parts of buildings are the places that few people see, but that fulfill critical functions. Such entirely utilitarian spaces have their own elegant simplicity, unconstrained by aesthetic design considerations. I also love love climbing stairs, ladders, and anything else I can use to get high up off the ground; that's been true since as far back as I can remember.

I was at the high school doing some more work on lights today and shot a few photos from the front-of-house position, a catwalk that spans the width of the auditorium about forty feet above the seats.


Front of House Lights - Indian Trail High School


I was a little happier to be working by myself. When a student was with me last time, I was pretty nervous. It's no reflection on him; it's just really hard for me to watch someone muscle twenty-pound, multi-hundred-dollar lighting instruments around over open air. I feel more in control when I'm the one handling the equipment, though I still made sure that no one was sitting in the seats directly under me. The thought of breaking expensive things is a little worrying, but the thought of accidentally killing someone is terrifying.
stormdog: (Kira)
2015-01-02 02:18 pm
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Dubuque Theatres

Photos of two large, historic (1890 and 1910) theatre buildings in Dubuque behind the cut. )

One of them is an earlier Rapp and Rapp design. The architectural firm of Rapp and Rapp is nationally famous for work on theatres in the 1920s and '30s, as well as some earlier and later examples.

The Grand Opera House is an 1890 Richardsonian Romanesque, and the 1910 Five Flags Center (neƩ Majestic) is, I think, some sort of European revival style. Theatres in 1910 hadn't gotten nearly as whimisical and flamboyant as they could be in the '20s, but they were still pretty grand, and sometimes fanciful, affairs.
stormdog: (Kira)
2014-12-30 05:48 pm
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Theatre Work with my Dad

My dad (right) teaches high school theatre. Here he is on the stage at Indian Trail Academy in Kenosha, where he and I joined a number of other people in set preparation for an upcoming show.


My Dad at Indian Trails Academy


I was helping hang lights. It'd been a while since I did any work in technical theatre. It was fun; I miss it from time to time. I'd never have guessed, back when I was in high school and doing community theatre work with my dad, that he would eventually be doing this professionally and that I'd still have the chance to work with him sometimes. This little bit of continuity makes me happy.