Drama 16 Stage Lighting

http://www.posters.ws/images/153626/dave_matthews_band.jpg

cold

While trying to find a picture for this assignment I had trouble thinking of the right words to use as synonyms for cold, so I looked up a definition. The one that best described what I was thinking is this one:

a : marked by a lack of the warmth of normal human emotion, friendliness, or compassion ; also : not moved to enthusiasm

I feel as if this picture really embraces most of this definition. It feels sterile. The light is bright on their faces and there are no major shadows. It gives me a sort of unsettling feeling when i look at it too long. It feels like most of the colors are shades of blue and the photographer used a similar color deprivation (no red) like what we discussed in class.

1. 
2. I found this photo while procrastinating. Sadly, there was no author connected to the photo. It was part of a compilation of photos.(The link is http://iwastesomuchtime.com/on/?i=21713)
3. COLD
4. This picture, while the scene itself does not seem cold, the color and light gives off a cold emotion. The lonesome bench sits there, surrounded by an ominous blue fog. The tree’s dark branches hovering over, judging from afar. The pink on the ground and in the trees is warm, but it is this warmth that magnifies the cold emotion in the blue fog. The eye is drawn to it. There is no life, there is no presence. The sense of emptiness is enhanced by the open space filled with the blue light. The dark bench has no life to it. It seems so lifeless, nothing but an inanimate object in this light. The blue fog acts like a border, keeping the warmth of pink away. The pink in the background cannot even penetrate the blue fog. Imagine sitting on the bench, cuddled up on one side, stretching your coat over your legs to stay warm just like you used to do as a child. You feel cold, caused by the actual temperature or by the absence of lively substance. This lighting could be applied to the stage. This could create a cold social scene. The tree colors representing innocent bystanders surrounding the fog of baren existence. In the middle of this fog sits an old man, totally forgotten by his family. Everyone around him goes on with their lives, paying no attention to him as if he is not even there. He feels alone and cold, recounting old memories. He feels a shiver in his spine. The loneliness has set in and has transformed into physical feelings. His sadness is chilling. He views the people around him as an illusion. Surrounding yourself in happiness does not make you happy; it makes you envious of others. His cold fog will grow and push those that he cares about away. Eventually, he reaches a hypothermic stage of depression, and dies. No one notices though, the scene still seems as lifeless as it did before.

1. Wednesday, February 8^th, 2012. 8:15AM, The Shower
2. I was in the shower, getting ready for my FAVORITE class (Stage Lighting) when I noticed that I had left the door to the bathroom open. After I finished my shower, I had soap in my eyes so I naturally reached for the towel outside the shower. Sadly, I forgot a towel. I tried to open my eyes to be able to see if there was something to rub the soap out of my eyes with. Nothing but the shower curtain, I started to gently push the soap away around my eyes. As I opened my eyes, I noticed the shower curtain was set perfectly in the middle of the stall. The natural morning light stretched all the way to the bathroom, which I was not accustomed to. The light bent around the curtain, filling the shower stall with light and making the shower curtain look like a bridge.
3.  The only way natural light can hit our bathroom is by leaving the bathroom door open in the morning and the window shades are up (which after last week’s incident, rarely happens). After forgetting to close the shades, bathroom door, and my towel, I was able to see a beautiful and rare light. The light flooded the sides of the shower curtain, creating a marvelous shape. It seemed as though the light blinded me on both sides so the shower curtain looked like a dark, mysterious bridge. I felt confused and a little dazed. The bridge was there to cross the pool of light. My shock slowly subsided and I gathered myself and exited the shower stall. As soon as I exited, the light from the window flowed straight into my eyes, blinding me temporarily. It reminded me of a strike of lighting, maybe not the color, but the feelings associated with it. I felt vulnerable (I was in the shower), confused, and blinded. Blinded to greed, ignorance, lust, and stress, if only for a moment. Most importantly I was blinded from my towel.

1. February 8th 2012, 6:00 PM outside the NAB on Hofstra campus.

2. The light from the Halogen lights on the West side of Emily Lowe  fell across the silver wall of the NAB, the bare branches between them casting shadows on the wall.

3. It’s cold today.  The sky is a bluish-grey.  A bit of snow is falling, but not thick enough to alter the light around us.  The sun is nearly set, but without the glowing splendor we’ve come to enjoy at Hofstra—All dusk means tonight is that the lights come on while the sky turns to dark.  The lights have come on, if we were on the other side of the building, the red-orange glow could easily be mistaken for the last rays of sunset.  The shadows of the trees are distinct: sharp, dark and slightly foreboding.  It’s a gobo in a halloween scare-show.  Or maybe Snow White’s nightmare-filled woods.  Perhaps the bare forest in a New England winter as Abigail Williams and her friends dance in the outskirts of Salem.  Hofstra University is not a scary place (gunshots heard from Hempstead notwithstanding).  This single location, this single splash of light and color, however, catches for a moment a classic image of terror.