Stage Lighting Workshop
with Gerry Corcoran & Rob Rogers

The workshop was held on the weekend of 13 & 14 August at Club Sapphire Merimbula and invitations were sent to other local theatre, music, dance and community groups in the region to participate...

A total of 15 participants attended the workshop and the feedback was very positive from all.

At this workshop we learnt about:

• Stage lighting equipment
• Safe setup and handling
• Lighting board operation
• Using colour
• Designing lighting effects

Workshop Outline

Session 1 Gerry Corcoran - 3 hours

Objective: Provide a basic knowledge of lighting for the stage including Safe use of Electricity, Lantern Use & Identification, Safely Rig Lanterns, Change a Blown Lamp.

1. Health & Safety and Safe Use of Electricity
2. Lantern Type, Identification & Uses
3. Lighting System Components
4. Safe and Correct Rigging of Lanterns

Session 2 - Rob Rogers - 3 hours

1. Using Lanterns, Colour, Angles & Effects for performance
2. Covering the why’s and how to's of lighting design for the stage

Session 3 - Gerry - 3 hours

Objective: Plan a Lighting Rig. Assemble, Use and maintain a simple Lighting Rig. Operate Two-Preset Manual Lighting Control. Introduction to use of a Memory Lighting Control

1. Planning a Lighting Rig
2. Assembly, Use & Maintenance of the Lighting Rig
3. Basic Operation of 2-Preset Manual Lighting Control
4. Introduction to Memory Lighting Control System

Session 4 - Gerry - 3 hours

Objective: Explain the ways of designing an even stage coverage for drama, music & dance and have some time to experiment with lighting and lighting effects. Also time to re-cap on anything participants would like to cover again.

1. Designing an Even Coverage for Drama
2. Other types of Performance Lighting
3. Experiment & Play
4. Re-cap, questions & pack away
   

About the Tutors

Rob Rogers has been involved with many aspects of theatre over the last 30 years including work as an actor, lighting designer, mechanist and production manager. He has worked as a production manager for Jigsaw Theatre Company, lighting designer for Splinters Theatre of Spectacle and has tutored in Technical Production for several youth theatres including Australian Theatre for Young People (ATYP) and Canberra Youth Theatre . He has a degree in Drama from the University of New England and currently teaches Drama and Music at Narooma High School.

Gerry Corcoran is a stage lighting technician based in Wolumla and is originally from Scotland. Gerry was Chief Electrician with the Pitlochry Festival Theatre in Scotland and Chief Electrician and Technical Training Tutor (Lighting) for the Royal Scottish Academy of Music Drama in Glasgow, for which he designed 40 shows. In his role as Sales Executive for Northern Light Stage & Technical Services Ltd, he provided customer training and lighting design services for all types of venues. Since moving to Australia in 2005, he has received certification in Safety Checking Electrical Appliances (Testing & Tagging) and since 2008 has been self employed as Gerry Corcoran Lighting Services, offering Production Lighting Design, Hire, Sales & Service for all types of events from small bands, dance, presentations to large shows and festivals including Footprint Theatre' "Ironbark", Narooma Oyster Festival, Merimbula Jazz Festival, Cobargo Folk Festival, Four Winds Festival (Bermagui), fLiNG Physical Theatre's "The Voyage" and "Homebase 2010", Canberra Concerto Orchestra Chamber Players (Bermagui), Candelo Village Festival, Sapphire Rock, Merimbula Carols by Candlelight, Merimbula New Year Eve Event and Murrah Hall Lighting Installation.

This workshop was supported by a Country Arts Support Program (CASP) grant and equipment was purchased using a grant from The Mumbulla Foundation.

Thanks to the following organisatons who supported this project