The Elation Color Tone 50

LOS ANGELES-Elation Professional's Color Tone 50, a DMX-controllable LED color changer for staging, entertainment and architectural applications, utilizes the all-new 50-watt Philips Lexel LED module, a homogenized LED light source. Unlike previous RGB LED fixtures that produced colors by combining red, green and blue beams from different LED lamps, all of the Color Tone 50's color blending is done within its single Philips Lexel module, designed to result in superior colors and a whole spectrum of whites that are perfectly even and consistent in tone. The new technology is designed to eliminate issues than can sometimes occur with RGB mixing, such as uneven output, discoloration, and "halos" or rings around beam edges.

Figure 1 – Light Spectra

Why LEDs render color—and skin tones—the way they do. 

I've no doubt that, by now, everyone reading this article has used an LED (Light Emitting Diode)-based light source on stage. Chances are you will have used them to provide colored light for a backdrop or cyc, or perhaps as effects lighting, or as direct view lights on the edge of steps or flats. It's less likely, although you might have experimented, that you are using them as key lighting or performer lights. Why is that? One obvious reason until recently is that they weren't bright enough, but the pace of development in LED efficiency is so rapid that this is no longer true. I suspect the main reason is that you weren't completely happy with the way the light looks on performers faces, the skin tones don't always look quite right somehow. To understand why this is the case, and what's being done by developers and manufacturers to remedy the situation, we need to delve a little into the details of the light spectrum produced by LEDs and get a feel for both its advantages and disadvantages.

Debbie Lamedman is not only an acting coach, but also a playwright. This is a scene from the premiere of her play Triangle Logic at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, with Trent Fucci and Brooke M. Haney

No-fail strategies for staying in top form during a long, grueling run

Actors cast in a successful show enjoy a lot of perks—a steady paycheck, a consistent creative outlet, bonding with a close-knit, long-term company. Still, a long run can be taxing. Maybe your role requires you to be killed in a swordfight eight times a week; maybe you’ve been in the same show so long you’re reciting lines in your sleep; maybe you’re run-down and catching cold after cold. Here are some tips on how to stay healthy and engaged, both physically and emotionally, so your performance grows better and better.

The new LED marquee on the Richmond CenterStage was one of the few modern touches the design team was able to make to the look of the theatre.

A look at the renovation of the Carpenter Theatre at the heart of the Richmond CenterStage Performing Arts Complex

Richmond CenterStage is a new arts center in downtown Richmond, Va. that’s truly community-based and boasts the renovated Carpenter Theatre at the heart of the complex. The Carpenter was originally the 1928 Loew’s Theatre with a rich Spanish Mission style designed by one of the great atmospheric architects of the day, John Eberson. It operated as a movie theatre until 1979 then underwent a renovation in 1983 when it was renamed the Carpenter Center for the Performing Arts. However the space still lacked the proper support needed to serve as the multi-function home for the city’s symphony, ballet and opera companies as well as accommodating other local producing organizations and touring productions. The Carpenter closed in 2004 for renovation and after a few stops and starts the newly renovated space reopened this past September. In addition to Broadway tours, the Carpenter Theatre is now the home for Richmond Symphony, Virginia Opera and the Richmond Ballet, all of which have very diverse needs of the performance space.

Games, warm-ups, skits, sketches & more

[We get so many good books a month, and we don’t like making people wait to read about them. So, from this month forward, we’re combining our Off the Shelf and The Play’s the Thing departments. Each month you’ll get the same helpful reviews of books about theatre arts and plays, they’ll just be in the same article. Less waiting and more theatre for everyone! —ed.]

Becoming comfortable on stage and in a character is important for actors of any age—but it’s especially so for young people, the focus of this month’s round-up of new books and plays.

Sound design is a tricky beast—part engineering (mic choice and placement), part composition (writing new music) and part console jockey (designing SFX on a computer and mixing), a good design draws on all parts of the brain. Luckily for Matt Nielson, a Washington, D.C.-based sound designer, he was able to learn from the best as he worked as audio master in theatres in the metro-D.C. area. Now resident sound designer at the Round House Theatre in D.C., he stopped by TheatreFace.com in August to talk about skills, process and getting ahead. To read a transcript of the entire interview, head over to www.theatreface.com/mattnielson.

The Sennheiser SKM 5200-II has a switching bandwidth of up to 184 MHz and a

OLD LYME, CT-Audio specialist Sennheiser has released the second generation of its top-of-the-line wireless handheld transmitter, the SKM 5200-II. The SKM 5200-II provides sound engineers with expanded switching bandwidth of up to 184 MHz. A further highlight is "Low Intermodulation" mode, which increases the number of usable channels in crowded RF environments.