One Destiny: The Trials and Tribulations

This week we began working on setting up for a two man show titled "One Destiny." The cast consists of Ed MacMurdo and Patrick Russell. Patrick is one of the regular actors down at the museum, mainly acting in "Ghosts of the Library" and Ed is the Attractions Coordinator in the Shows Division of the ALPLM. The show is directed by Phil Funkenbusch who is the Director of Theaters at the ALPLM. We are using some new boards for lighting and sound so I have been having to figure out how to operate the boards. For lighting we are using an ETC SmartFade 4896 which is similar to the light board that we have at school only it's all squished into a very small area. Basically one button does a lot of different functions so it's taking some time to get used to. The sound has been a rather interesting experience.
At the museum the sound room and lighting room are on two opposite sides of the theater, one on the left of the projector room and one on the right, and so we have had to run XLR cables from the sound room to the lighting room so that we could have both boards in one room so that one tech could run both if need be. So first off Jeff and I had to untangle cables from a mass that was taken out of one of the old exhibits that had been in the Illinois Gallery. http://www.alplm.org/museum/il_gallery.html And I thought some of the knots we've had to get out at school were bad...I was sadly mistaken. So we get the six cables untangled and then it comes time to run them from the sound room to the light room. This task wasn't to bad because it simply involved putting the cables up in a basket type contraption that runs through all of the rooms that are above Union Theater. Once we got all of the cords figured out and got everything sorted out, we thought, it was time to work on getting all of the boards set up and hooked up to the floor mics. Now the channels that we thought we were using were 9-12. Once we get everything working for the tech rehearsal yesterday we realize that the far SL mic wasn't working and nothing we tried fixed the problem. After rehearsal was over we began to investigate why the connection wasn't working, only to find out that we were actually supposed to be operating on channels 8-11 so we had soldered the wires onto the wrong channels. Well once all of that got sorted out everything began to run quite smoothly. Tonight's rehearsal went great. I have gotten to run the light board so far, and like I said earlier I am still trying to get it all fully figured out but it is rather simple to run once you understand all of its functions. I am predicting that if I am not working on other small projects, I will be running the lights and sound for most of the performances of this as well as "My Front Porch," which is another short piece that will be performed in the coming month. These two shows are mostly done in the summer and run anywhere from 1-2 times a day in the Union Theater. http://www.alplm.org/museum/storyteller.html
I also will be helping run lights for an upcoming event called "Pork Meets Cork."
It is going to be a rock concert that will be held out in the Union Station Park across from the museum. We will begin setting up the stage, lighting truss, and sound equipment in a couple of weeks and the event is being held on July 16th. I will have more about that event when it gets closer and we are beginning to get everything set up for it. Needless to say, I am sure that it is going to be a very exciting experience.