A Few Quick Sketches

The last show we did, Smokey Joe's Cafe, was pretty light on the paint end of things so I had some time to do a few sketches.

Forever Plaid - Plaid Drop

So it is safe to assume that when you are doing Forever Plaid that a lot of plaid will be involved.  The plaid in question came in the form of a drop.  At first it seemed like a very daunting task, considering our two week build for the show which also included a painted scrim portal.  However, through the sampling process we came up with a great process and the drop only took about two days to finish. 

Below is the designers elevation for the drop.  The main challenge was figuring out how to layer the plaid design properly.  The issue of paint consistency was also a challenge.  The consistency had to be enough to cover but also transparent enough to play with the colors of the lines below.

This is a sample board that I made to figure out the layering and paint consistency.  The colors in the sample are different than the final drop because I was mixing to a small elevation.  We later got an elevation from the designer that included paint chips which we mixed to.

After our layering process had been figured out it was time to begin layout.  We created story sticks for each section of lines to help with the layout and make sure we kept everything the same.  Since the tiny white lines were very small, only about an inch, and on the top layer we decided to base the drop white.  We then taped out the white lines so at the end we could just pull the tape and have our lines without having to paint them.  The rest of the drop was then based blue since that was the next layer in our process.

We decided that the plaid had three layers, more or less.  Below is a picture after the first layer had been finished.  The small white tape was used to separate the small red lines because they were not continuous in the design, but it was easier to just mask them using tape and paint a continuous line.

Below is the drop after the second layer was completed.  We had some dry time and really wanted to pull up the tape for the white lines.... so we did.  Even though the white lines were on the top layer, we could pull the tape at this stage because no other lines interacted with them.  *Sidenote: Some very sweet and deadly tape balls were made after this step!

The last and final layer!  We applied our lines in two fashions - using brushes and lining sticks and also masking/spraying with a cup gun.  Most of the horizontal lines were done using the cup gun while the vertical lines were done with a brush.  Ideally the whole drop would have been done with the cup gun because the designer wanted a very crisp, graphic look.  But the vertical sections were so intricate it would have taken too long to mask.  So we compromised.

The final step was a few sprays to even everything out and blend the drop together nicely.  Here's an up close photo.

Here is a picture that I took during a rehearsal of the drop in action.  The plaid was the same as the actors jackets, which was fun... everything matched!  They were still adjusting lighting cues so the drop is a little dark.  I'll have to get some better photos with the moon out of the way.

Sleuth - The Floor

So the floor for Sleuth, was as you could guess, a planked wood floor!  We attacked this floor in a similar manner as the Musicals floor.  A main difference with the Sleuth floor was the boards went back slightly in forced perspective.  So after figuring out our vanishing point and whatnot we were able to lay out points for the bottom edge of the floor as well as the upstage side for our lining.  

The first step was a directional wet blend, as seen below.  

Next step was a spatter and drag to give the floor more dimension and layers.

After, an all over glaze was done.  This helped to nicely blend everything together.   The lining was then laid out and painted.

Once the lining was completed a second spray and all over wash was done to set the lining back in with the rest of the floor  as well as to add richness.  The last step was a seal coat using Future floor wax.

I really like the way this floor turned out.  It had a nice richness on stage with the set and under the lighting.

Sleuth - Set Photos

Here are a few more images of the set for Sleuth. The show was a lot of fun to work on - lots and lots of wood grain!  It was a huge set with tons of little details, which I think was really nice.  As I understand it, this has been one of the larger sets that the Cape Playhouse has done in awhile.

Up next, some photos of our floor process for Sleuth!

Sleuth - Bobbinet Wallpaper Stencil

So it's been awhile since my last update, the build for Slueth has come and gone. We are getting ready to open Forever Plaid on Monday so we are busily working away. We just finished up a huge plaid drop today...will post pictures soon. First I figured I should post on Sleuth.

The set for Sleuth was a box set of a gothic style interior. Two of the main walls had a very detailed wallpaper pattern. Because the pattern was so intricate we decided that a bobbinet stencil would be the best plan of attack. The designer had graciously sent us a scaled print out of the pattern, which made our job so much easier.

We started out by pouncing the pattern on to two sheets of craft paper. One sheet was set aside for later, while the other was covered in packing tape on both sides to help make the stencil studier and somewhat resistant to the paint so it wouldn't fall apart. After the sheet had been covered in packing tape we began to cut out the pieces. In this instance we were going to be spraying in the negative spaces, so we cut out and saved the positive pieces of the images. After we had finished cutting out all of the pattern we laid our other full pounce sheet out. This was used as a guide for the pattern and we adhered the cut out pieces on top lightly with masking tape to keep them in place. This step can been seen in the picture below.



The next step was to lay the bobbinet material over our pattern as well as the frame.  Once the bobbinet was adhered to the frame we began to glue the pattern pieces to the fabric.  This was done using a hot glue gun.  We traced along the outside of each piece to make sure that it was firmly stuck to the bobbinet.



Once all the pieces were glued and the frame secured the stencil was finished! Ta-da!



And here are some pictures of the finished walls on stage.

Musical of Musicals: The floor

So by now the first show has been well underway and we have been furiously working on the massive set for Sleuth.  I realize however, that I've neglected to show the floor for Musical of Musicals.

It was a fairly simple treatment - a loose, blendy planked floor.  Lining this floor was certainly an interesting experience since the shop floor is so uneven the maso had a tendency to warp creating uneven seems.  This became a bit frustrating because the paint liked to pool in these seems.

At any rate, it turned out pretty nice.  Our process included basing out the maso in a light tan color and then working a raw sienna and burnt umber color together in a directional wet blend.  Next we worked on the crazy amount of lining for the planks.  After we did an all over glaze that had a bit of a burnt sienna tint to it.  This really helped to pull all the colors together and set the lining back in with the rest of the floor.  The last step was a seal of Future floor wax to help keep down all the scuff marks from the dancing.

More to come on Sleuth in a few days. The show opens on Monday so it is going to be a hectic weekend!

Musical Of Musicals: The Musical - Drop Stage Shot

So here's a photo of the drop as it is in the show. Please excuse the horrible photo quality and lighting as I didn't have my tripod with me and the lighting is post show. The drop appears a bit fuzzed out because there is a scrim hanging in front of it.

Also here is a shot of the leg walls that we also did for the show.  Check out that sweet lining.  Between the flats and floor for this show and all the lining for the next show, Sleuth, not to mention Forever Plaid, I am going to be SO GOOD at lining haha.

Musical of Musicals: The Musical - Drop

So the first image is the designer's rendering for the drop. The whole rendering has a fairly loose quality with a watercolor feel, especially in the sky. The line quality was pretty heavy handed and very loose, often interacting between several different planes, such as going from  signs to the buildings.The first part of our process, after we had laid out the drop and starched, was to layout a grid and cartoon out the image.  Instead of laying out the grid and the drawing directly onto to the drop we laid it out on a large section of bogus paper.  After we had the drawing how we wanted it, we pounced the image onto the drop.  By pouncing the image to the drop instead of drawing directly on the muslin we were able to keep the charcoal to a minimum on the drop.  This was especially important since we were using fairly watered down, lighter colors.  To seal in our image so that we could begin painting without losing all our details, like the lettering, we did a quick spray of watered down plastic varnish flat.  This sealed the charcoal into the muslin but still left us with a nice surface to paint on.

Next we began to lay in the sky.  We first blocked in the different colors and then blended.  We then applied various sprays to even everything out and further blend the clouds together.

The rest of the drop was a fairly simple process.  We blocked in the buildings in a flat black, blocked in the background of the signs, and then added in the lettering.  After those main elements were all in we added some details.  These details included some blue shadowing in the buildings, the light bulbs around the signs and the flair of light from the them.  The very last step was the lining which we did with a highlight, muslin type color and a dark black.


All in all, I think it turned out fairly well.  It was a very quick drop, only took about two and a half days including all the layout and cartooning.

Heyo

So I am starting this blog as a way to keep track of the different projects that I work on as a scenic artist.  More importantly I hope to use this to serve as documentation for various processes and techniques so that I have steps to refer back to in the future.  I really wish that I had thought of this last year and kept it going through my time at Juilliard.  At any rate, I anticipate the first few projects that I'll document here will be somewhat simple as they will be pieces from the shows this summer, and since we have a two week build time there isn't a whole lot of time to fuss with details unfortunately.