Late Nights and Parade Floats

Two months left here at Six Flags and I am still having a damn good time.

My days off this week were spent entirely in Chicago with Kim and Malary. I finally got around to seeing Jersey Boys-- I loved loved loved it! I wasn't a fan of the projections, they felt distracting and tacky, but if you get the chance I highly recommend seeing it. Next week is the Taste of Chicago, which includes free concerts every night in Butler Park. I'm going to see Barenaked Ladies on Tuesday!

2pm breakfast with Kim on my day off.

We are in full swing for Night Parade setup at the moment. Days have been filled with the usual three shows, then we have to break for an hour and a half until the park closes and guests leave so we can work out in Hometown Square (the area including the parade start point and an outdoor stage for the preshow). Tonight included focusing the lights on top of buildings surrounding the area and along the trusses on the outdoor parade stage. I've never done a focus from on top of trusses but it's a really good time. We have to wear harnesses and clip off as we go along which can get irritating, but it keeps us safe so I can't really complain.

Passing gel up to Erica on the truss. You can almost see my ever-classy uniform of navy Six Flags polo/navy dickies. Hooray!

Something I've loved about this job is the variety of instruments that are used here. Outside we use everything from old crappy par cans (they've been called a headlight in a tin can more than once), to intelligent lights (mostly trackspots) inside weatherproof shells, and we even mount HUGE super trooper spotlights on top of buildings (it takes a crane. seriously.). We've also been hanging strobe ropes everywhere. Before working here I'd never heard of strobe rope, but it's essentially like a string of mini strobe lights and looks like a million little camera flashes going off. The effect is really neat, I want to get some of my own to play with (except I just looked up how much they cost. yipes.). Inside there is a huge variety (lots of MACs and cybers), but the basics are covered by source fours (which is mostly what we use in Fisher) so it's nice to have something familiar around as well. I've been nerding out about learning the different fixtures :)

View from the scaffolding just below the trusses, over Hometown Square.

The whole process of lighting a parade makes me think about how much fun general atmospheric lighting can be. Anything from department stores to haunted houses to amusement rides (i.e. "It's a Small World" or "Pirates of the Caribbean" at Disney) was done by a lighting designer. Sounds like fun.

I don't have any pictures of the parade stage yet, but this is the set for Show Stoppin', my main show.

Anyhow, we just have to finish cleaning off the rest of the parade floats by Sunday night and we'll be ready. The designer will keep programming while the performers rehearse on the stage for the next three nights. Once night parade opens we bump up to four shows per day followed immediately by parade. I'm exhausted from getting off work at 1am each night, but it feels really satisfying to have spent my day running shows and climbing trusses!