Drama 16 Stage Lighting

Date.Time.Location- 4/3/19. 6:30 PM. The choir loft of my church

Objective description- I was spending a late night at my church making sure things were in order for a youth gathering we will be bringing our kids to in July to Minnesota. I sat in the choir loft by our enormous pipe organ as I looked through the paper work. As the sun began to set outside, the orange strips of light began to shine through the stained glass window directly opposite the organ. This strong and yet rapidly fading orange light filled the choir loft and the sanctuary beneath.

Subjective description- It is moments like this that truly allow me to sit back and take inventory as I reflect on another long day come to pass. The natural lighting that the church takes advantage of really has a way of reflecting ones emotions at any given time. During this time of the day I was exhausted after a long day at school and at work and these orange beams of light were showcasing their strength through their intensity as they managed to slither and slip their way through the stained glass and into the choir loft before settling down in the sanctuary beneath my. These beams reflected just what kind of a day I had just had. This was a day of action, a day of work, another day of trials and tribulation. These beams of orange were strong and yet they were rapidly dwindling in their power as the sun returned to its place of rest as the moon took over the sky once more. These orange beams beckoned ever stronger, they symbolized an ever approaching time of rest. These beams filled me with the kind of warmth and reprieve that comes with wrapping oneself in the covers of their bed as they drift off into a well-deserved deep sleep at the end of a long day. These rays of orange worked there way around the loft and enveloped me in their warm embrace so as to tell me “your job is through, and now it is time to rest”. It was these exact beams of orange that motivated me to make the short drive back home and allow myself to be whisked away to the realm of dreams before having to start the cycle over again the following day. This day had dwindled away and the new one would soon be arriving when the sun returned to the sky.

1) 2012-04-08, 10:15 AM, The National Cathedral, Washington DC

2) OBJECTIVE DESCRIPTION: Light through the stained glass windows above the knave hitting a black safety net strung above everybody’s heads.

3) I chose to sit in the rear balcony of the cathedral to be able to take it in all at once.  Of course the building is packed— it’s Easter sunday in one of the largest cathedrals in te United States.  I was dissapointed to see the expansive black netting covering the ceiling of the cathedral: this is a gothic cathedral, a structure designed for great shafts of light to fill the building.  Because of the repairs above, however, they had to protect the general public from falling gargoyles or something like that.  The color and the light of the stained glass above was still visible, but instead of falling to the people and stonework below, the shifting patterns of light played out across the netting above.  One of the best things about stained glass in the morning is you can physically see the sun moving across the sky as the colors change, bend, and shift before you.