Drama 16 Stage Lighting

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THEME: Dealer’s Choice

I think I first came across this when perusing The Daily What (a la memebase), with a caption about the cool effects of long exposure photography and the emergence of light art – I didn’t really read it, I was just captivated by the pretty. Besides just how cool it looks and how much talent this must have taken, you can really get drawn in to the story being told. Maybe it’s a social commentary on our public school system, maybe youth in general. The asian script on the wall hangings could even be commenting a country in particular – or maybe it was just a perfect setting for someone to experiment with glow sticks. Either way, it’s an incredibly thought provoking image aided by the manipulation of light, color AND a camera, which I just find impressive.

17 April, 2012
South Campus
Around  5:00 pm

I’ve just gotten off work and am walking from the eastern side of south campus towards Emily Lowe. It’s one of the insanely hot days we had earlier this week, the sun shining bright and hard. Squinting up at the sky, I notice something I had never actively noticed before: the clouds between me and the sun have shadows.

For whatever reason, this really surprised me. I’ve been on many planes before and have noticed when we’re still flying low that patches of the green down below is covered with a cloud’s shadow, but it is so immense that you don’t notice you are in fact in a shadow when you’re on the ground. But when I looked up at the sky and saw the outer edges of the fluffy white clouds strikingly brighter than the center of the cloud facing away from the sun, I realized that I had never actively made notice of the fact that clouds have shadows. It makes perfect sense – objects cast shadows, mass casts shadows. But for whatever reason I never connected that to clouds. Which means that every single drawing I did as a kid with the yellow sun taking up one corner and a tree the other with some white clouds in the middle have been inaccurate – there should have been some grey in those clouds, even in the perfect spring or summer scenes I drew. This realization was surprisingly thought provoking for me. I should probably pay more attention to my surroundings so I don’t miss these obvious things.

1. Sunday April 14th 6pm Somewhere around Farmingdale on Highway 27

2. The sunlight has been bright all day but rain clouds are starting to roll in. The edge of the clouds is illuminated as a bright bright yellow making a straight line in the sky between the gray clouds and otherwise blue, cloudless sky.

3.The day was one of the warmest all week and there was alot of traffic out on the roads, the hustle and bustle everywhere made sitting in the car for an hour treacherous. Highways here are all about the publicity so stores line these roads as far as the eye can see. As we reached the last few miles of the trip I sat up to the edge of my seat and as I looked out there was this angel like power coming from the sky. Not just the way I saw it as the edge of a massive cloud but the godly shine split the sky in half. The overall illumination of everything didn’t change but when you looked up its like another world. It was the definition of appreciate the little things.

2) Dena Kline

3) Dealer’s Choice

4) The Pope’s general whiteness contradicts from the almost complete blackness behind him. The brightest part about this photo is the fact that even with the Pope’s white robes and the white window next to him, his hair is the brightest part of this picture. The sun hits the Pope to brighten his hair even more.

1. 4/16/12, 7:37, Alliance 11th floor

2. The sun was setting outside my window and the sky was orange and dark blue with the city line in the background.

3. I was reading when I looked out my window to see the sun setting and the horizon was covered with this orange glow. The rest of the sky was a dark blue and it reminded me of the sunset in the lion king. It was really beautiful. Especially with the city in the background. It I couldn’t still see the sun I probably would have assumed that the city was on fire. It was that bright and intensely orange.

  2. owner:Fresnatic, time lasp over Seattle

3. Nature vs City

4. the two different light sources allow for contrast but there is a harmony between them that isn’t always achieved. Often city lights are so bright and intense but can’t compare to the immense beauty and magnitude of a sunset. The location blends the blues on the horizon grab your eye and pull you through to the white at the bottom of the photo. It shows that even people who live in cities are surrounded by nature and can enjoy it. The snow also gives a special quality to the photo. Instead of just a brown lifeless ground it becomes reflective. In a perspective that you would think a clear divide would happen the boundaries are fuzzed between the cars and sky or ground. This photo is alive. Its bright with colors that can never be recreated.

1. http://www.flickr.com/photos/tamedblossom/3754644663/

2. Dealer’s Choice

3. This photo is part of an incredible underwater series called “Abyss of the Disheartened” on flickr. The entire series of photographs is of this couple, in the same location, but each picture is entirely unique. This one specifically is one of my favorites – it’s so ethereal and beautiful. The light is cool, and green tinted. It makes the photo seem eerie, mysterious, foreign – a strange, new world. Around the couple is deep shadow, leaving only them illuminated in that light, adding to that strange, magical feeling the photo gives. It’s like watching an unreal dance unfold before your eyes, like a memory or an old movie. The lighting really sets the mood of the photo, and adds to the beauty of it.

1)   4/6/12 – 9:32 PM – In airplane, roughly 20,000 feet in altitude somewhere over east coast.

2)   OBJECTIVE DESCRIPTION: I was flying from Philadelphia to Dublin for spring break. There was a close to full moon out as we took off. As we ascended above the east coast, I looked out the window on the right side of the plane and noticed the moon. It was shining brightly and was casting a long reflection onto the water. You could tell where the land was because there was no reflection.

3)   SUBJECTIVE DESCRIPTION: I was finally given the break I was looking for. After a lot of work at school I could not wait for my flight to take off and take me to Dublin for a nice vacation with my parents. I flew in to Philadelphia airport and met my parents where we then proceeded on to Dublin. As we took off there was a low cloud cover that did not allow us to see any stars or the moon that was above us. As we climbed out of the city, we followed the coast north and broke out of the clouds relatively quickly. As we continued north, the clouds below us began to break and the moon became apparent to my mom and me. It was shining intensely and fully over the Atlantic Ocean. As we looked down to the ground below us we noticed the reflection it was creating on the ocean and all of the inlets below us. The pure, brilliant light was shining down and casting a very long and calming reflection all the way to the coast.

As we climbed higher and traveled further north the image became more and more brilliant and beautiful. The light was able to shine clearly through the air and make a very vivid reflection across the Atlantic. The image of this reflection appeared to be so calm and gentle. the water looked so calm and did not seem like we were looking out on the ocean at all. At most it looked simply like a pond of calm water no giant waves or rough water. Looking at the dark spots that represented the land provided a clear and vivid contrast of land and sea that truly enhanced the picture outside of our plane. I stared out of the window watching the light change and watching the dark areas of the coast fly by beneath us. It was so calm and relaxing… just like I wanted my break to be.

1) 4/18/12 – 12:42 PM – Walking from Netherlands core to Groningen house

2) OBJECTIVE DESCRIPTION: I was walking home from working on Spring Awakening and was listening to music as I slowly walked through the Netherlands. The lamps that are contained within the courtyard areas were all on and I was looking down at my feet. As I passed each lamp my shadow moved with the light and I had many shadows from each light.

3) SUBJECTIVE DESCRIPTION: I was strolling home from the studio somewhat late on thursday night. I was in no hurry and had my IPod playing the new Train CD and I was simply enjoying my favorite band while I took in the fresh aroma of the spring flowers. On my lackadaisical walk across campus I was focused and enveloped within my music. I was mostly focused on looking down at the side walk as I was really trying to pay close attention to the lyrics. Just as i entered the Netherlands my attention began to shift to a new area of my surroundings. Inside of the Netherlands there are a series of street lamps that help illuminate the inside courtyard so that we are able to see when we are walking from one house to the next. What I suddenly became aware of was my shadow that was being cast from these lamps.

The lamps are staggered evenly down the side walk from the core to the back entrance. As I approached the first lamp I noticed that it cast a shadow down of my body. As I got closer to the lamp, my shadow began to get smaller until I was dead even with the lamp and then as I waled past the post my shadow would grow longer once more. Just as the shadow began to disappear, a new one began to show up just as quickly, but this time from the other side of my body (because the light was now to the left of me). As I walked all the way to  my door, I passed a total of five lamp posts, studying each shadow as I walked past. The shadows reminded me of a circus. A circus with stretchy mirrors or creepy shadows that always seem to be following a clown and just as soon as one reflection or shadow leaves a new one appears. It was a very neat illusion and now I find if almost impossible to not have a lighting moment every time I come home at night.

2) Photo taken by Nic Christopher. Taken around 6:53 on 4/9/12 on the Dingle Peninsula in Ireland.

3) THEME: Dealer’s Choice- BRILLIANT!

4) DESCRIPTION: This is one of my most recent pictures that I have added to my collection of shots from around the world. I was happy to hear that this week was “Dealer’s Choice” because I couldn’t wait to use one of the pictures I took in Ireland for a photo observation. I noticed that when I am taking my pictures now, I am much more aware of the light around me. When flipping through my pictures and looking at the ones with interesting lighting, I stumbled across this one and decided to make my theme BRILLIANT!

Brilliant- splendid or magnificent, that is what I saw within this image. The Dingle peninsula is crawling with 30 miles of old churches, small islands and ancient monastic temple ruins. Everywhere I turned I was either walking into a sheep or stumbling across ruins from a once prospering monastic settlement. Unfortunately, the day that I spent touring the Dingle peninsula, it was rather stormy and the rain was coming in fierce but short bursts. The spotty weather made picture taking hard and sightseeing limiting. Just as I was wrapping up my drive the clouds started to clear and the sun began to poke its way through.  We drove past this church and bell tower and pulled over to check out one last set of remains from an ancient oratory. As I got out of the car, I stopped and looked up to see that the bell tower was in a perfect silhouette and the clouds were magnificent.

I see this image and immediately think of the word brilliant because of the way the sun seems to almost be pushing the clouds away and blowing them out in all directions. The sun appears to be almost a living force that is fighting the clouds and making its space in the sky. now that it has made its space the images on earth become much more enhanced and stunning. The way the bell tower is positioned directly in front of the sun surrounded by the clouds is simply magnificent. The sky almost appears to be on fire, the light is so pure and the colors are so vivid. It was a wonderful way to end our damp drive; the firey bright sky bursting open to cast the late evening light on our last sight for the day.