On the other side of the pastel green planet...

My textbook is currently available for pre-order at Amazon .  It will be available December 3rd (shortly after LDI).  In the text I discuss different approaches to media design.  One of those methodologies is the "concept based" design.  This is where the media designer looks to the design of the show purely on the concept of what they want to happen, then find a way to make it happen.  They are not necessarily constrained by what is already existing.  The video below speaks of this approach beautifully.

You can now pre-order my textbook on Amazon !  I am so excited about its release.  This was a strange journey in writing a book, especially since I learned "on the job."

CIRQUE DU SOLEIL ACQUIRES ENTERTAINMENT PHENOMENON BLUE MAN GROUP   Montreal, Quebec, July 6 th , 2017.   Global entertainment leader Cirque du Soleil today announced the acquisition of New-York-based Blue Man Productions, a global live entertainment company best known for the award-winning Blue Man Group show, performed in over 20 countries and seen by more than 35 million people worldwide since 1991. The acquisition of Blue Man Group considerably widens Cirque du Soleil’s audience pool, adding to their portfolio six resident productions established across the United States and Germany, as well as a North American and a World Tour. The transaction is in line with Cirque du Soleil’s vision for the future, as the Montreal-based creative powerhouse looks to further expand globally and diversify its entertainment offering beyond circus arts. With its original aesthetics, award-winning musical talent and immersive experience know-how, the acquisition of Blue Man Group also ...

Nearing my deadline for my upcoming textbook: Media Design and Technology for Live Entertainment Essential Tools for Video Presentation In addition, I have been teaching classes at various regional theater conferences (look for one near you!). Cheers!

Wow, what a year 2016 has been.  I apparently dropped off the face of the pastel green planet.  I have been busy for sure.  This year at work has brought a lot of special projects.  One of my favorites was contributing graphics for Dancing With the Stars (which I enjoy watching with my daughter).  No, I am not credited, as I did this as one of the "other duties as assigned" for my employer.  Totally fine by me, it was fun. Politically, this was an interesting year.  I spent a good deal of time correcting people who posted false news sites on Facebook and other social media.  I know that I strained a lot of relationships, but I felt that it was still necessary.  Scientific American wrote a good article about the reasons that people believe false news (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-to-convince-someone-when-facts-fail/).  Why is this relevant?  Well, people believe crazy things in the live entertainment field as well...

One of the things I am often asked about is "What do I need to have projection/video for my next production?".  Obviously this will never be a simple answer and I will always answer with a battery of questions.  Instead of going into all of the questions, being this is a single sided dialogue, I will over the next several weeks go over what I see as a direction for design.  I plan on giving you a parts manual of sorts.  Each part of a projection system will work together to bring about the end result.  Without understanding how the parts work, it would be impossible to describe the process.  Consider the end result of the video system like a clock face.  The end user doesn't really care what goes into the inner workings, only that they can tell the time accurately.  The clock designer will choose between an analog system with gears, springs, and other mechanical parts or a digital system with its related parts.  In both instances, there is ...

A couple of years ago I helped on a rather large scale project.  It was for a non-profit organization which I particularly like their mission.  So, when I was asked to help out with the visual aspects (projection), I accepted.  However, I didn't realize what I had signed on for. I work on one of the biggest permanent productions in history.  While I am used to working with and conversing with professionals of a similar background, I often forget just how foreign video can be.  After all, most every household has some sort of television that has any number of peripherals connected.  However, even the most experienced home user does not have the necessary vocabulary to discuss a large scale production. Here's the thing.  I am a geek for technology.  I love it.  I'm not just talking about the latest and greatest either.  I love all technology.  See, I went to school to become an archaeologist and my main focus was on ancient techno...

Partway through my last update, I got busy again.  So, it is still sitting in the drafts.  However, I am slowly getting back up and running.  I am currently creating some PowerPoint presentations for introduction to video.  I am also helping a student with her thesis project and will be one of the readers as well as teaching a couple workshops.  I have also decided to begin writing a textbook based on the introduction to projection.  I may start to publish bits of the book or presentations here as a preview. 

I know that it has been quite a while since my last post.  I haven't abandoned doing this, just life has been happening, a lot.  So, I will be catching up with some new musings in the following days about all that has been keeping me so occupied and sometimes unmotivated.

Tonight is kind of a sad night for me.  One of my friends is leaving and heading on to a new journey in life.  How appropriate on New Year's.  She will be greatly missed.  She's actually from the light side of the theater.  She is a bright shining star who will be benefitting a city filled with stars who don't shine nearly as bright as her.  I hope my friends in her new area will have the chance to benefit from her spirit. There is often the division between performers and technicians.  Heck, I have been one to say "An actor [performer] without technicians try to emote, standing naked in the dark, while a technician without an actor is someone with marketable skills."  Funny as it is, it is just as negative as the nasty performers in our lives.  After all, with our marketable skills, we should be able to make more money than as stagehands.  We don't because we love what we do (or we don't stay in the business).  While I will be ...

When I was starting out in college, I majored in theater (emphasis on technical theater).  Silly thing is, I only received an Associate of Arts (2 year degree program) in theater, because I wanted to be an archaeologist.  So, yeah, I went to another college/university to get my degree in that.  But I digress. While getting my degree in theater I had to take acting classes.  Acting can be fun, but I prefer to be behind the scenes.  Something very useful that they teach the actors is to know where you are going.  This is useful for them when something goes wrong (someone forgets a line, there is some technical glitch, whatever).  It is obvious when you have an amateur actor on stage when something goes wrong because they will often freeze, run off stage, or do something really stupid.  On the other hand, a well trained actor will handle the situation so well that you, in the audience, will be hard pressed to know if they are covering up a fau...

I like to be prepared.  I don't like surprises (in a bad way).  So, yes, when I travel, my bag is usually packed with more than what I want, and hopefully I won't end up needing anything.  Such was the case with a recent business trip that I took.  First of all, the system that I was responsible for was tested and fully planned for any problems that could arise when arriving on site.  I was very thankful for that since we ended up with other challenges. Now, this event had live performers as well who would be doing some stunts.  In preparation, we trained before hand as well as on site to make sure that if anything were to go wrong that we would be able to get our performers medical attention as soon as possible.  This goes along the line with normal training in basic first aid and CPR that normally goes into my work.  We also train in electrical safety (had my electrical hazard, safety toe shoes on for the entire event) as well as other hazards...

We have all been instructed that it is important to back up our files on our computers.  After all, hard drives crash, yadda, yadda, yadda.  I know some people who are extremely good about this.  I went out and purchased an external hard drive and have backed up quite a few files, even if I don't do it on a schedule yet.  Yet, I still seem to never get around to organizing all those files, I just know they exist multiple places. Sure, this goes along with physical things as well.  I know that I have boxes of things that I don't need (hoarder?, just in my garage) and should get rid of.  At least when I moved from Arizona, I had a wonderful opportunity to purge.  The people at Goodwill knew at the sight of my car that there would be a lot to unload (actually exceeded my IRS allotment for donations that year).  Even at that, I know that I really need to purge more and also organize what I have. So, today, I had my laziness bite me in the rear....

Aside from being busy at work, I have been creating a second blog.  This one is not theater related, but was requested none the less.  You see, my wife gave me a set of Zombie Magnetic Poetry for Christmas and I started writing poems on the refrigerator.  My youngest happened to be collecting them in a notebook, so when I was asked to share them, I created a new blog.  Please enjoy the poetry and comments are welcome. http://eerieedgar.blogspot.com/ I'll get back to the theater related posts soon.  It's just been a busy season as I'm sure you all understand.

Sorry to anyone who was a fan of President George W. Bush for me borrowing one of his terms.  However, I tried to think how better to express how I felt after giving a presentation last month.  I volunteered to give a presentation on the basics of video for theater at the Nevada State Thespian Convention.  Since I was a Thespian in high school and there was a definite shortage of technical classes, I felt that I could take the opportunity to help out the next generation, as I do moderating ControlBooth .  So here's how it goes.  The announcement comes through that they need presenters.  I say, sure, I'll help out.  I've been pretty busy at work and home and don't take a close look at the date when I do so.  I go home and check the calendar to make note of when I'm going to do the presentation and the date seems off.  Usually these sort of conferences happen over a weekend, and I was pretty sure that I...

Earlier tonight I was reading about the OSHA fines for Spiderman Turn off the Dark .  This got me thinking about another tragedy that happened a couple years back when a performer in a Christmas pageant fell to her death after a similar mishap.  In both instances, the performer did not have their safety device fully engaged which resulted in the accident.  Regardless of fault, both were the result of human error.  The biggest difference between these two incidents is that one had an employee injured and the other had a volunteer die.  Since OSHA only covers the workplace, then the church who had a performer die had no repercussions. Sorry about the short post, I'll add more soon.

Check this out, two posts in one day. Anyhow, I like the idea of improving myself in my career.  By this I mean, I don't climb the corporate ladder just to be above everyone else or purely for more money, but I like to challenge myself and not stagnate.  Even if there is not an opportunity at the moment, I try to go to trade shows to learn from industry representatives and read trade magazines to see what other people are using and give me an idea of whom I should speak with when I get to the shows.  So a little while back, I was given the opportunity to maybe make a career advancement.  In some ways it is scary.  I have a family with young children and so if I make a change that takes me to a new city, it's a big change, no matter the job.  A little over three years ago, I made that choice, uprooted my family from our home of many years, and moved to a city that I'd never really considered living in.  The job is amazing.  I make almost twice ...

No, I don't have a headache, I just had to dredge up some old knowledge today.  Today, we are working on a 3D movie - reshooting some scenes and new footage for some others.  This of course is in a custom built theater, with a permanent show (thus pretty set lighting package), and we haven't changed much of the equipment since it was installed.  On top of that, the equipment that was installed wasn't all top of the line at the time either.  For instance, two of the lighting consoles were the last two made by the manufacturer before they discontinued it for their new line of consoles.  The other consoles were in their prime at the same time Windows XP was rolling out.  Anyhow, cameras see the world differently than the human eye.  In order to make the end product look normal to our eyes, quite a bit has to be changed on the front end, usually making it brighter.  This is especially the case on this particular show as the lighting designer tended ...

Lately it seems my blog posts have been quite preachy.  Let me tell you that I do practice what I preach.  On the other hand, I have been told that the posts don't reflect me very well.  While I am a stickler for safety and want to help everyone succeed all the time, I'm usually the quickest to give a friendly smile as well.  Heck, I decided it was time to liven things up a bit, so to speak.  I added a new section to the store (now located down at the bottom of the page for easy viewing).  I titled it Zombie Apocalypse .  I will continue to add to that section just as I am continually adding to the other sections.  I'm not new to the Zombie Apocalypse band wagon.  I have been a fan of monster movies since I was a kid.  Well, that takes a little clarification, I've been a fan since I figured out how to not be scared of them.  I remember watching a vampire movie and having nightmares after my nap.  After a good sit down with ...

I work on what could be arguably said to be the largest show in the world.  While I don't work with the latest and greatest equipment, I have the resources to keep the show up and running.  It takes a lot of resources to maintain the multitude of lights and other equipment running. Am I bragging?  Not really (though I do love my job).  What spawned this was the reality check that I recently received.  Last week (seems like ages ago, really), I took my two youngest children to see Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day   (example of this production here ) which is a musical adaptation of the children's book of the same name.  This was not locally produced, but was brought in by a children's theater company out of California.  Needless to say, it was not the biggest budget production out there.  Lighting was simple washes.  The set was a single drop with set props to designate scene/place changes. Why di...