I Can See Clearly Now
Apr 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Ellen Lampert-Gréaux
Dickinson captured the energy and flexibility of a screen in the format of a round tube, avoiding his fear of ’’mindless content playing in the background.”
Broadcast in HD from the Staples Center in Los Angeles on Sunday, February 10, the 50
As for the relationship between lighting and HD, there is no big change in the sensitivity of the cameras in terms of light levels. “There are no real differences in terms of intensity or color choices, although everything is sharper and clearer in HD,” says Dickinson. However, he does find there is a major consideration when it comes to lighting faces. “You really have to be careful in terms of angle and texture; every little wrinkle shows now. I work with the directors to make sure the angles are correct, and we put filters into the cameras,” he explains. “The scrutiny of the cameras is intense, and all of the imperfections get highlighted.”
For a complicated broadcast like the Grammys, Dickinson begins the design process about nine months out. “For about the past 10 years, there has been a double-stage system, so while an act is performing on one stage, they can switch the band on the other one. They get more music in this way,” he explains, adding that there were a total of 24 musical numbers this year, with just one to one-and-a-half hours to rehearse each one.
“You ask a lot of ‘what-ifs?' when designing something like this. We even explored the idea of doing it in the round, but in truth, for the Grammys, you want to be able to morph into the world of each production number. But in the round, you never morph away from the audience,” Dickinson says. The final scenic scenario is a flexible theatrical environment designed by Steve Bass and Brian Stonestreet. “But we are designing in a vacuum,” he adds. “We don't even know the names of the nominees. At the last second, we are retrofitting a look for a specific act into the overall look for the show.” Dickinson points out that the design team met regularly over the summer and then accelerated the schedule to once a week in November, December, and January. “We hone down the concepts to find the winning solution, which this year was hyper-flexible to accommodate any act,” he says.
In fact, Dickinson finds that the performers are more pro-active these days than in the past. “They used to show up on rehearsal day. Now they want renderings and enter into the discussion about their songs. This forces the designers to think out of the box. The performers ask questions, and we find a better solution. All this happens during a three-week period once the nominations are announced.” Although the nominees are announced a scant three weeks before the broadcast, Dickinson's rig was laid out by mid-October 2007 and ready to be put out for bids. The majority of the gear (see list on p. 27) came from PRG, with the exception of the 3kW Xenon Falcon Beams from Alpha One Technology — used as large wash lights as well as for powerful beams from the floor — and the 1,000 Element Lab Versa
The VersaTubes played an integral part in the lighting. Or is it the scenery? Or projection? Or maybe a good example of convergence? “I find myself at war with screens,” says Dickinson. “We fall victim to our own best tools. Screens and media gave us a lot of flexibility without physically changing the environment, like lighting does by its very nature. But screens are so pervasive and so overused. I live in fear of mindless content playing in the background now that everyone has a screen.”
Instead, Dickinson set out to capture the energy and flexibility of a screen in the format of a round tube. “They can be butted up against each other without looking like a screen,” he says, referring to the VersaTubes, which he has added to his rig for several recent productions. “I like the energy of media not in a format that is so predictable,” he adds. That said, the set did include a variety of screens, including two large Da-Lite RP screens, each measuring 12'×72' for a 144'-wide image. These screens hung above the VersaTube panels, and Dickinson referred to their shape as “an interesting format.”
There was also a large LED screen placed center stage, referred to as the “monolith.” This was created using 240 Barco ILite 6mm LED modules and used for video sequences such as Beyoncé's roll call of great black female singers. An additional 79 Barco ILite modules were used to create an LED screen stage left in the center of the VersaTube array. When Alicia Keys performed a duet with Frank Sinatra, “Old Blue Eyes” appeared on a 103'-wide Panasonic plasma screen placed center stage, adding a layer of black and white video.
The LED and RP screens, along with two 23.5'×24' Da-Lite RP screens used for audience screens (not seen by television viewers), were provided by American Hi Definition Inc. The company also provided eight Christie HD18 DLP Projectors used as rear projectors for the large RP screens and four Christie S+20 DLP Projectors — two in executive boxes and the other two near the camera platform in the front — for the audience screens.
The 1,000 VersaTubes were placed on moving set pieces to create a kinetic chevron pattern, adding a strong design element with digital light. “They are really bright and powerful as well as responsive to the music, yet there is no flare with the cameras,” Dickinson points out. In terms of the color palette, he notes, “When we lay out a show, we look at the nature and tempo of each song to select the colors, but we don't want four songs in a row to be the same color, so we decide which look goes with which song without being redundant.”
