This stage set was a challenge because i was not totally sold on the idea. Idea after idea was passed around, and frankly to create a canyon on the stage was a bit out of my realm of experience. I love to try my hand at new things, but this was something that seemed a bit to big to tackle.
The first challenge was the series is about bridging relationships to your friends to lead them to Christ. What is the key word…bridge…and that is what illustration was needed on the stage, not just for someone to point and speak about because I could do that with projection, but a physical bridge to bring into a drama. It also needed to be built across the entire series (which is why you won’t see a totally completed picture up yet). Ok. So I needed to build a bridge on stage, first issue in my mind is safety. People are actually supposed to walk across that so I had to get my mind around how I was going to accomplish this without it falling apart, and doing it rather cheap. The bases had to be sturdy and not collapse inwards when weight was spanned between the two. We usually use Wanger riser platforms to start as a base for things, but I needed to be able to a) screw into it, and b) stabilize it well. The wangers didn’t fall under this category at all. So my mind went to these old camera stand platforms that were built and never used. They were built out of wood (so I could screw into them) and they were low to the ground and build solid. Low center of gravity and good construction = sturdy base that wouldn’t collapse. So I began to think about how the bridge would be pieced together.
Now came the next uh-oh. My task was to make the stage look like a canyon, but it couldn’t look cheesy (almost the exact words…that I was told). I’ve seen a number of ways to create rock looking facades but only a few of them looked half way decent, and I didn’t have the money to go out and buy spray foam and cover the structure with quickcrete. So after fighting logistics, I came to a plan to use chicken wire as my structure, and a dark brown “butcher paper” found out a local teacher supply store as my rock texture and surface. I glued in a little bit of moss from a craft supply store and viola instant rock surface.
<edit> One of the ideas was to take out the floor on the stage. It is built up computer floor pieces, so it comes out with a few screws. The only problem is it becomes an instant death trap…anyone accidentally falling in would end up impaled on the floor supports…yeah that’s not osha approved.</edit>
Take a look at the two albums to see what the rocks started as, and how I added to the stage to fill it out after the initial bridge base was constructed. I still included some projection to add a bit more depth, but it’s not shown in the pictures, (mainly because it’s a small, cheap projector and it doesn’t really look so good, it’s more to facilitate having lyrics on the stage for students who come to the front of the stage for worship).
Have questions? leave them…I’ll be glad to dive more into the process of the rocks and the bridge if you’d like.
