Budget

In traditional theatrical models, such as regional theatre, producers and production managers start with stock budgets for shows. They have experience budgeting different types of productions and so they often allocate money to different departments long before the artistic team or concept is even assembled and created. Once the artistic team has a clearer vision of the approach they will take, line items in the budget are often shifted to reflect the actual needs of executing the production.

Scheduling

A successful digital media design can live and die by the schedule. It is vital to fully communicate what your design for the show is trying to achieve in order to help the production manager create a specific calendar for the production. Here are some general things to consider when determining scheduling needs with the production manager:

1. There is a tremendous amount of overlap with scenic, lighting, and sound. For instance, if a video is prerecorded, it needs to be clear not only who is going to record sound on set but also who is going to edit and master the sound. How will the sound for a video be played back in the theatre? Who is responsible for what affects the master schedule? Be sure that you and the production manager (PM) consider all the overlaps, including whether lighting, sound, and digital media can work at the same time once in tech or if you can share the same crew.
2. How will you be implementing digital media? A basic question might be, “what type of content is it and how will it be created?” Will most of the content be 2D or 3D animations or video production with actors? These answers help guide you in scheduling. For example, if you are creating prerecorded videos, it is imperative to remember that these video shoots are mini productions. A video shoot often requires all of the same departments (actors, set, props, costumes, hair/makeup, lighting, sound, etc.) that are already working on the show, plus the addition of camera, postproduction, locations, and so forth.
3. Decide how the videos will be created. You can’t always do every job that a video shoot requires. Sometimes you can, if the shoot is small enough. But sometimes you can’t, because the shoot is too large. You need to work with the production manager and artistic team to decide if the video shoot will use the same designers and technicians who are working on the production or you will hire additional designers and crew. Who is directing the actors? When do they rehearse? All of this needs to be considered and planned for accordingly in the schedule, since you are now planning a video production within a stage production. Work with the production manager to schedule preproduction, production, and postproduction of the video shoots. It isn’t feasible for all of this scheduling and managing to fall solely on the digital media designer when coordinating with a large production group. This responsibility must be shared with the production manager.
4. We urge you to advocate that the PM coordinates the video production schedule inside the show’s master schedule. If you are using specific things that are also being used onstage, such as the same props or costumes or puppets, the due dates of those items from the various theatre production departments need to be due earlier than normal, to fit into the video production schedule. The PM also needs to make sure that the stage manager works with the director to schedule time for the actors to rehearse a scene that is going to be recorded. They can’t just show up to a video shoot unrehearsed.
5. Like anything else in scheduling, you need to work backwards. So, make sure you leave enough time after shooting to edit the video, add effects, complete post production, and then export/render it to have it ready for playback in tech. This is also a good time to consider the video production workflow, as you need to be able to make constant changes to the assets as you get notes and feedback from the director and other creatives on the project.
6. Understand how the media server is being used. Some media servers are easier and faster to program than others. Knowing how the media server handles the compositing and cueing of content ensures that you are able to generate content that is ready to be loaded and programmed during tech.

Personnel/Crew

Other departments have established workflow and personnel. Most theatres have a staff master electrician, technical director, props master, seamstresses, and so forth. However, most theatres do not have a dedicated digital media technician. In fact, it is common for lighting and sound technicians to be tasked with acting as a digital media technician.

When a lighting designer designs a show, the theatre usually provides a master electrician, a board programmer/operator, and electricians to hang and focus. The same type of personnel should be supplied for the digital media department. If these crew members are not on the team, the digital media designer needs to know up front. If the designer is installing the system, programming the media server, and teaching a board operator how to run the show, the pay scale, workload, and expectations need to be negotiated to reflect the additional work on top of creating and designing content.

Often there is not a budget for an associate or assistant designer. This is important, because the size of your team radically affects the schedule and workflow. If, as a designer, you are installing the system and programming the show, that means the time you have to focus on content creation and other design responsibilities is greatly diminished.

When possible, advocate for a team. Producers and PMs have to work within the constraints of a budget, but remind them that you are only one person and can’t and shouldn’t be expected to do it all. Your design will be better if you have an assistant and a media server programmer. If you are unable to arrange for the extra help, it is your responsibility to manage the expectations of the director and collaborators to ensure they understand what is reasonable and to avoid burning out by overworking yourself.

Digital Media in the Rehearsal Hall

If interactive digital media is to be used in the rehearsal hall, the stage manager needs to work with the production manager and digital media designer to coordinate the technical needs, setup, and operation of a system that is installed in the rehearsal hall. This means you now have to coordinate with the PM and SM to schedule time to install/strike the rehearsal system, as well as allocate a technician/operator (or assistant designer) to be present at rehearsals. The rehearsal schedule needs to consider when interactive digital media is used and should reflect that in call times and so forth. The SM works with you and the director to come up with a schedule, so that working drafts of the content are ready and can be programmed for playback in rehearsal. Having interactive media in the rehearsal hall changes not only when content is due but also the programming of the rehearsal hall playback system.

Directors

Digital media can do just about anything—anything that money and/or time can buy and we can envision. The more compelling ways digital media in live performance weaves technology, systems, and design into the DNA of storytelling, the more it dramaturgically links them to the core of meaning making. When incorporating digital media into live performance, consider and respond to the director’s vision.

As you begin your career, you may find yourself working with directors who are using digital media for the first time. In some cases, directors don’t have training or experience in what digital media actually can do, let alone how to use it effectively in a stage production. They may have no training or experience in animations, camera angles, color intensity, and so forth. As a designer, it is your responsibility to translate the possibilities into language and visuals they can understand and to set proper expectations.

If a director hasn’t worked with digital media yet, they most certainly have seen a production that has included digital media or projections. We find that discussing with directors what they have seen before and what they like and dislike about their experiences can be quite informative. The conversations seem to go best if you are able to delay focusing on technical details and focus instead on their perceptions of how the digital media meaningfully contributed to the production. This aids you in describing your ideas. Anything you can do to help the director think in the languages of the various digital media you are using is beneficial. These conversations are important to the process and help create a better end result.

In our experience, directors inexperienced with digital media tend to spend a great deal of time staging the production, yet often little time thinking about how to incorporate the digital image into the full stage picture. We encourage you to remind the director that it is her responsibility to work with you to also stage the digital media. Some things you and the director need to think about are:

• From what side of the frame and where onstage should an animation begin, or put another way, what is the media’s blocking?
• Where is the actor onstage going to stand in relation to the projected image and how do the two interact?
• Are these interactions passive, or do they need to be rehearsed?
• What does the interaction between digitally mediated elements and live elements mean or signify? How does it help tell the story? What does it mean to an audience?
• Since digital media can steal focus, where should the focus onstage be at any given moment?
• If using front projection, is it appropriate to see video on the actors’ bodies? How should you handle the shadows that performers will cast on screens they are standing in front of? Are there projector installation options that allow these shadows to be avoided?

You and the director must always be able to answer the fundamental question of why digital media is being used in this moment and how it relates to dramaturgy and story. The answer does not need to be complicated. It just comes down to you working with the director in order to really understand what your goals in the design are and how that is translated to an audience. You both need to understand the meaning behind your choices, including how content is displayed, use of real-time vs. rendered content, style, aesthetic, how the design interacts with the live performers, and how the design integrates into the space.

Actors

If you are using only atmospheric digital media you may hardly have any direct contact with the actors beyond being in the theatre together through the technical rehearsals. If you are using any kind of interactive digital media, you certainly need to directly work with the actors. You may need to teach them how to operate a video camera used live onstage, or how to control and perform with digital characters or avatars. You may also need to work with them if they are involved in any original videos in which they perform.

All directors are different, so make sure to consult with the director first about talking to the actors about anything beyond technical issues. Some directors want you to give them a note and then they will give the note to the actors. Other directors would prefer you to just talk directly with the actors. If the conversation is anything technical, such as framing, or camera angles from a live video camera or tips on any type of sensor interaction, we suggest you talking directly to the performer, the same way a choreographer or fight captain might.

Rehearsing with Interactive Digital Media

Rehearsal is the place to explore and experiment. Actors and the director spend weeks in a room together to explore, take risks, and create the physical and psychological world of human emotions and the spoken word. So why don’t we default to incorporating interactive digital media into rehearsals?

In addition to budgetary and scheduling reasons, and the fact that it can be labor-intensive or difficult to install in a rehearsal space, we sometimes exclude interactive digital media in rehearsals simply because we misunderstand or haven’t clearly defined it. We tend to simply define all digital media as an atmospheric design element. Since we haven’t been making the distinctions

Case Study 2.2 Rehearsing with Interactive Digital Media

by Daniel Fine
¡Bocón! by Lisa Loomer
Arizona State University Mainstage School of Film, Dance and Theatre 2013

• Digital Media Designer: Daniel Fine
• Associate Digital Media Designer: Matthew Ragan
• Director: Megan Weaver
• Scenic Designer: Jacob Pinholster
• Costume Designer: Connie Furr-Soloman
• Lighting Designer: Celeste Lee
• Sound Designer: Stephen Christensen

Figure 2.1 On the Steps of the Palace, composite of four images. Some of the floor is cut off in the lower right.

Source: Matthew Ragan and Daniel Fine

This production had a traditional process and schedule, but I insisted that media be present in the room. Associate Matthew Ragan and I installed a projector in the hall the second week of rehearsals. Our final system consisted of five computers running nine projectors beamed onto a 20x20 foot square of floor space and 105 feet of surround screens. Yet, we used only a single projector—a crappy old one at that—in rehearsal. Since the images on the surround screens were atmospheric and didn’t affect the performers in any way, content for the screen was added in tech. However, the actors interacted with the projections on the floor, which meant they needed to be present in rehearsal. This way, the actors had time outside the pressures of tech to play with the floor projections.

Because the interactive media system was in the rehearsal hall, we discovered that the type of artwork I had originally conceived didn’t quite work. We also discovered that our interactive system could ultimately become a simpler, more straightforward playback system. These rehearsal hall discoveries saved the media department a lot of time finessing a system and creating a style of artwork that ultimately did not serve the production. We had the time to adjust the interactive media rather than scrambling in tech at the last minute. The key here is that we were all okay with risk, which inherently means that failure is a distinct possibility. Our design department was like a performer, trying something in rehearsal and ultimately learning that it didn’t work. This was a valuable lesson learned by being in the rehearsal hall early in the process.

Figure 2.2 ¡Bocón! system

Source: Daniel Fine

between types of digital media, as defined in Chapter 1, we’ve just gone along with the assumption that it is sufficiently proper to add interactive digital media into tech week.

Now that we have made a distinction between atmospheric media and interactive media, we know that interactive media is much more like a character and must be in rehearsal with the actors and directors. When we wait to incorporate the interaction between the actor and the system during tech week there is not enough time to teach the actor how to work the system, nor enough time to consider how to incorporate the interaction into the rest of the design elements. If the live actor needs to respond to a design element that is happening in real time, then the two must have adequate time to get to know each other. Tech week is a time to bring everything together, not a time to work on the nuanced moments that are created when incorporating interactive digital media and live performance.

Case Study 2.3 SparrowSong: Rehearsing with Interactive Digital Media

by Daniel Fine
SparrowSong
Arizona State University School of Film, Dance and Theatre 2013

• Digital Media Designer/Creator: Daniel Fine
• Director/Creator: Megan Flod Johnson
• Performer/Creator: Julie Rada
• Scenic Designer: Brunella Provvidente
• Lighting Designer: Adam Vachon
• Costume Designer: Anastasia Scheider
• Contributing Artists: Matthew Ragan, Tristan Bustamante, Aimee Leon, Amy Masters, Andrea Silkey, and Muharrem Yildirim

Figure 2.3 SparrowSong performer Julie Rada, interacting with a bird via a Kinect sensor

Source: Daniel Fine

This production was a performance installation created by three primary artists—a performer, a director, and myself as media designer. From the beginning, we embedded technology and projections into the story. The performance could not exist without media to extend the magical reality that was a foundation of the story. We created the physical space and the story with the central ideas of the performer and audience being able to interact with technology.

During the performance, the actor drew on the walls of the theatre, the floor, and the walls of the installation with chalk. Her chalk drawings came to life through animated drawings, which were projected onto the surface of the installation. One of the drawings that came to life was of a bird. When the actor noticed the projected bird, she stepped into a Kinect sensor activation area to become a bird like her new friend.

Since the audience also used the interactive technology, they relied on the performer to teach them how to use it during the course of the performance. The actor really had to be well versed in all the variables of the interactive media. So, early in the creative process, I brought part of the interactive system (laptop, pico projector, and Kinect sensor) into the rehearsal hall. It was by no means anywhere near what the complete system, projected onto a finished set, would look like. But it gave us a sense of what it would feel like and allowed the performer to play with the interactive media as if it were a fellow actor. By having a mock system in place in the rehearsal hall, the actor discovered the subtlety of how her movement controlled the avatar.

As a designer, I spent time tweaking settings, and discovered that I was tracking too many skeletal joints and feeding too much data into the system, causing an unworkable amount of latency. By having the system up on its feet, I was able to fine-tune these settings long before tech week. Having time to rehearse with the interactive media gave the director a clear understanding of how the interactions worked and what the limitations of the technology and interaction were. This knowledge helped her conceptualize and stage the action more clearly. It also allowed the entire team the time to create a real relationship between a character (played by a living actor) and a digital character (controlled by the same actor). Because we rehearsed with the interactive digital media, this relationship was crystal clear to the audience and the technology became an integral part of the production.

Figure 2.4 SparrowSong system

Source: Daniel Fine

Adding interactive digital media into the rehearsal hall can be daunting, time-consuming, and expensive. Those that do it well, though, such as Robert LePage’s Ex Machina, The Wooster Group, and The Builders Association, have learned that the complete integration of digital media design into their rehearsal and devising processes can yield amazing and dramaturgically meaningful theatrical results.

Scenic

There is a lot of overlap between scenic and digital media. The way the digital media designer thinks about the meaning of content is often determined by the final display. Display surfaces also directly impact the digital media design workflow, budget, and schedule. So, before the digital media design can really begin in earnest, the set design must be determined. The reverse is also true. Set designers need to understand how the digital media is to be used and what type and style of content will be created so they can design appropriate surfaces and architecture.

Establishing a good connection with the scenic designer and having your needs be heard by them early in their design process is critical to your success. All of the great content you make is lost without a thoughtfully considered surface to display it. The display method and the content are interconnected. The shapes, color, and texture of a set’s architecture, including screens, are symbols that convey meaning. Audiences understand different architectural design elements to mean different things unto themselves and in relation to one another. So, before there is any content displayed on the physical object that reflects the projections or displays the content, there is meaning, there is symbolism. You can participate in the designing of these surfaces if you work with the set designer and director before scenic roughs are due.

Join the director and scenic designer in their first meetings. Listen to the concept of the director and how the scenic designer interprets it. Go to the theatre with them both and pay attention to viewing angles, ceiling or proscenium arch heights, and other elements that restrict the physical layout of your projectors or rigging points for immersive displays, such as LED curtains. How large the set is and where it sits on the stage influences where you can put your projectors and restricts use of front and rear projection very quickly.

It is collaboration with the scenic designer and director that provides you an opportunity to make any significant requests supporting your own design. For instance, when working on the Wizard of Oz, if you have a specific idea for the scale, placement, and so forth about the surface where the Wizard is going to appear in his projected form, communicate this to the scenic designer as early in the process as possible.

Be prepared to have a dialogue with the scenic designer about the angles of walls and screens to best suit an audience viewing angle for a projection or about what the best treatment of a surface may be in order to best reflect projection light. Depending on the show, the scenic designer may be in the situation of dictating aspects of the media design as it relates to the support of the scenery. We have worked on shows where the scenic designer actually provided specific assets he or she wanted to use in correlation to the architecture. Projected content can shift the meaning and shapes of the architectural world of the play. If you are projecting on an architectural element, such as a wall, the content alters the scenic designer’s vision for that wall, in terms of how physical texture, color, and style are brought to life by the projections.

Establish the expectations that the scenic designer has for the digital media as early in your design process as possible. What role does digital media play in the production? Is it purely scenic? If so, then you should encourage the scenic designer to be more involved in the design of the digital content. If there were traditional painted backdrops, the scenic designer would provide renderings, so they logically could be involved in the creation of any atmospheric digital media that is acting as scenery.

Screens

Digital media can take over. Most audiences tend to watch moving content on a screen of any size rather than a live performer, especially projections on a giant white screen. So, you must carefully consider how the size, shape, and location of a screen amplify or otherwise frame the audience’s gaze, potentially stealing focus from the actors onstage.

The same content projected onto a set piece blends with the environment differently, and possibly means something else, than the same images projected onto what is clearly a screen. The audience already has a relationship with screens and understands what they represent. The semiotics of projected video on screens vs. architecture is different.

Don’t get us wrong—we like screens. The correct screen makes content look great. But is that the right choice for the narrative in a theatrical context, for meaning making? How does the inclusion of a screen, especially a giant white one, alter the world of the play? Why build a carefully considered, realistic scenic world that has a giant white screen in it?

A lot of digital media designers want to project onto actual architecture vs. screens. However, screens are often appropriate for the aesthetics of a show or can be prescribed by a director or scenic designer’s approach to the show’s design. There are also times the budget won’t allow for the build of additional detailed set pieces and projections are asked to simulate architecture and backdrops in a way that mimics painted backdrops and in turn demands large projection screens.

The shape, size, aspect ratio, surface, and so forth of the physical screens affect the style and aesthetic of digital media content. It matters in terms of both meaning making and content creation if you are creating one large image to be displayed across one giant surface vs. four smaller surfaces located in different areas of the stage. It makes a difference if digital media is projected on a 42′ × 30′ screen vs. three 14′ × 15′ freestanding screens vs. a brick wall. When using multiple screens, is there supposed to be one image spread across all of them or is there different content on each screen? If there is different content per screen, then it means that for the same amount of stage time, the amount of content that needs to be designed, executed, and programmed for playback is multiplied by the number of screens.

Another thing to consider when including a giant white screen is that with nothing on it, giant white screens really stand out. The answer? Put projections on it. The results? An entire show with projections on a giant screen, regardless of whether it is dramaturgically correct.

Most theatres cannot afford commercially manufactured projection screens, especially giant rear projection screens. So, we are often forced to use poly cycs or muslin as screen surfaces, which are not ideal surfaces for projections. They absorb more light or have rough surfaces that diffuse an image, either making the projections dim or otherwise reducing image quality beyond acceptable levels. These types of materials were not created or treated to hold projections, so they don’t have the proper type of reflective qualities that make for a vibrant image in a lit performance area.

These materials are more porous than screens, so oftentimes you can clearly see the light source from the projector when rear projecting. This normally creates a distracting hotspot on the screen in the center of the projection cone and often is painful at worse and annoying at best for audiences to stare at. It is hard to get a crisp image on these surfaces, causing the images to look washed out in terms of color and contrast and/or soft in terms of focus. In situations where a hard focus is not wanted, these materials can be used to great effect to smooth out the hard edges of a digital image.

Ground Plan

A floor plan shows a to-scale, top-down representation of the performance space. The floor plan includes the permanent architectural elements of the theatre and also the set. You use the ground plan to help determine your projector placement based on the width of the surfaces you need to project onto.

Figure 2.5 Sample ground plan from The Merry Wives of Windsor . Great River Shakespeare Festival. Winona, Minnesota, 2014. Scenic design by R. Eric Stone.

Source: R. Eric Stone

Elevations and Sections

Elevations are typically from front view. These help you see the height and width and any details of surfaces you will project onto. You may be able to use elevations in your presentations to show what images may look like on a specific surface. Sections are typically from the side view. Sections help you determine projector placement based on the height of the projection surface.

Figure 2.6 Sample front elevation from The Merry Wives of Windsor . Great River Shakespeare Festival. Winona, Minnesota, 2014. Scenic design by R. Eric Stone.

Source: R. Eric Stone

Figure 2.7 Sample side section from The Merry Wives of Windsor . Great River Shakespeare Festival. Winona, Minnesota, 2014. Scenic design by R. Eric Stone.

Source: R. Eric Stone

Lighting

Because digital media design regularly utilizes a light source, a lot of productions and educational institutions include video/media under the realm of the lighting department. Many rock-and-roll concerts, corporate events, and regional/educational theatres combine the roles of lighting and digital media designers. It is an obvious first choice, as both departments are dealing with light. However, not all lighting designers (LD) are video designers, or digital media content creators.

No matter the final display option we choose, all of the choices for presenting video or still imagery in theatre use light in order for the content to be visible. There are self-emitting light sources and interfaces, such as video walls, LED curtains/panels, TVs, and AR/VR. There are also light sources that can beam the content onto other pieces of physical architecture/screens, such as projectors. The digital media designer and the lighting designer must work together to integrate these additional types of digital media light sources with the lighting department’s traditional incandescent and LED lighting instruments, practicals, and so forth in order to achieve a unified design.

Figure 2.8 Sample line set schedule from The Merry Wives of Windsor . Great River Shakespeare Festival. Winona, Minnesota, 2014. Scenic design by R. Eric Stone.

Source: R. Eric Stone

Digital media designers need to understand lighting design in order to properly design a show that is cohesive in its appearance. Thankfully, many lighting designers now use pre-visualization to show early on how they will illuminate the set and performers. A modern lighting designer may come back soon after receiving set design sketches and show a rendering with their lighting included. It is helpful for the digital media designer to see early ideas of how lighting will actually be integrated with the set. However, there may also be times where you are handed a lighting plot, which is basically a map of where the lighting instruments will be placed, and you will have to envision how the design is going to look.

Color Palette

Color palette is an important part of the collaboration between digital media and lighting. Oddly enough it is often overlooked. Traditionally, designers try to work with similar or purposefully contrasting color palettes to create a unified design and/or a specific moment in the show. Don’t be afraid to have a conversation with the lighting designer (all designers and the director, really) about color and how it applies to storytelling. Some things to consider are:

1. Will an overall color grading, such as sepia, be added to all video?
2. Will there be a purposeful muting of colors?
3. Will x-color pop and glow?
4. Will the color palette change over time?
5. How can colors be unified (or not) among departments?
6. How is digital media design treating color to help tell the story, or create a mood?
7. Does the video need to have subtle gradations of color and/or provide saturated colors?
8. Be flexible. Even though many discussions and planning may have happened, colors often need to be tweaked and refined in tech, once all the design elements are seen together.
9. To help create unity once in tech, digital media’s colors can be modified in the media server and lighting’s colors can be changed by swapping gels or altering color if using controllable LED lighting fixtures.

The answers to these types of questions are just as important as answers to similar questions in all other design departments. Yet, sometimes it isn’t always easy to decide color palettes for projections in advance. The

Case Study 2.4 Color Palette and Temperature

by Daniel Fine
Terra Tractus Lighting
Terra Tractus
Projects for a New Millennium 2014

• Digital Media Designer: Daniel Fine and Matthew Ragan
• Associate Digital Media Designer: Alex Oliszewski
• Director: Tom Burnett
• Lighting Designer: Jamie Burnett
• Music/Sound Designer: Istvan Peter B’Racz

I was co-media designer with Matthew Ragan on a production of Terra Tractus, for which we worked extremely fast. We created all the content for a one-hour-plus show in just a little over two weeks with a department of three. We projected onto the stone surface of a rock quarry, so there was a lot of trial and error in terms of finding the right colors that looked good on the stone. Lighting designer Jamie Burnett used mostly LED fixtures for the show, allowing him to easily change the color of his lights on the fly, versus needing to decide weeks in advance if he had used gels. This freed up the digital media design team so we were not restricted by color, which was difficult for us to ultimately get 100 percent correct until we were at the venue. Because of the ease with which lighting could make color adjustments, we decided that lighting would play off of media, basing the color palette off of the projections. Sometimes Jamie matched the color palette of the projections and other times he played against it, creating contrast with an opposite palette.

Figure 2.9 Contrasting color palette of Terra Tractus

Source: Alex Oliszewski

Figure 2.10 Complementary color palette of Terra Tractus

Source: Alex Oliszewski

I have also worked in reverse on productions, where the lighting department utilized incandescent instruments with manually installed gels. This relies on projections to be more flexible and match color to lighting, manipulating the color within the media server and when needed, re-rendering content.

best results we have achieved in our own work has come when we have worked closely with lighting designers to consider their intended color palettes and we have provided enough feedback and examples of our work that they have time to consider and adapt to our designs.

Sound

In much the same way that digital media and projection designers are just now being integrated into the standard theatrical process, audio has gone through a similar integration process since the 1990s. We now take for granted the ability and protocols to use audio in our productions, something the theatre profession is currently dealing with in digital media design.

In the production process, sound design and projection design often work in sync with each other. Think back to the AV Club in high school: audiovisual. Typically, if you have video there is going to be some kind of audio element associated with it, be it a person talking, music, or sound effects. This has the potential to affect the sound production pipeline from content creation to recording, editing, output, and playback.

The principles that define what a digital media design is can also be found in sound design. Terms like linear and nonlinear, timeline-based, and interactivity were often applied to sound design prior to being available to digital media design technology.

Often scripts or concepts call for recorded material like montages or music videos that require audio to exist. There is much inspiration to be gained by collaborating with sound design, and it is good to gain knowledge of sound design techniques, equipment, and processes, just like with lighting design.

You may find there are times that you are playing sound from the media server into the sound board, where the output is mixed or otherwise balanced with other elements. Other times, you may end up simply linking the video cues with the sound server to ensure that everything lines up. In the most complicated setups you will use some form of networked timecode based system.

Costumes

Designers have been creating costumes that transform or reveal surprises for centuries. As evidenced by Loie Fuller’s work in the late 1800s, using costumes as a surface for lighting and eventually projections is not a new idea. Other art forms, such as music (concerts), dance, and performance art, have been quicker to incorporate analog and new digital technologies, such as embedding LED lighting into costumes. The growing consumer fascination with wearable technologies in the fashion and technology worlds is opening up tremendous potential for new and exciting collaborations between costumes and digital media design in the theatre.

An obvious and growing trend is to map projections onto bodies. This requires close collaboration with a costume designer to choose fabrics that reflect light, have the proper silhouettes, allow for the addition and inclusion of electronic components, and so forth. Another use for embedding digital technology into costumes is motion tracking. For example, a useful way to track a performer is through infrared (IR) LED lights. IR cameras can see these lights and thus track performers. In turn, this tracking data is used to maintain a direct placement and connection with projections following moving performers. Depending on the exact system that you are using, costume designers might need to include pockets for transmitters, so be sure to inform them as early as possible.

The most common overlap with the costume designer is when certain costumes need to be ready for a video shoot. If you are going to have a video shoot for a production with actors, you need to coordinate with the costume designer of the show. Often the characters need to wear the same costumes in the video as they wear on the stage. This demands that the costumes needed for the shoot are completed with enough time for the video shoot and postproduction time. This accelerated schedule demand is generally outside the realm of typical expectations and may well be outside the realm of a costume designer’s experience. It is crucial that video production dates are on everyone’s calendar and incorporated into the costume department’s master schedule.

It is best if the show’s costume designer also designs the costumes for the video sequences, so that the character’s clothing choices all live inside the same dramaturgical world. If another designer is used for the videos, make sure that there is communication between the two designers, so that a cohesive design is achieved.

A representative from costumes should be on set when shooting. Just as we have dressers, makeup artists, and wardrobe managers backstage during the show, we need this kind of support when producing our videos. This person is responsible for the costumes and must also be able to attend to any details that may arise on set.

On most theatre productions, by default, hair and makeup fall to the costume designer. This is not the case in video production. There is usually a separate designer or designers for hair and makeup. Hair and makeup may need to be refreshed throughout the day of a video shoot and you need an experienced professional on hand to do so. Makeup for the stage does not translate the same for a video shoot, where you may have a high-resolution camera in a close-up on an actor’s face. Don’t fail to factor in this element of a video shoot and hire an experienced video makeup artist.

If you are using live video onstage, make sure to set time for tests with costumes under stage lighting. You may find that a perfect costume for the stage does not translate to a live feed displayed either via projections or a screen. The stage lighting might be too dim and a dark color in a costume could be lost on the projection surface. Also, note that the pinstripes or fine geometric details of a suit’s textiles can cause weird, rainbow-like video-flicker.

Since performers are often in front of screens and projection surfaces, it is good to collaborate with the costume designer regarding color palette. You don’t want to find yourself in a situation in tech where you discover all the main characters are in red and all the content has a red color grading, thus making the characters unintentionally fade into the images.

While costumes are typically a bit more removed in their direct involvement with a digital media design, the costume designer has a lot to offer in terms of defining the characters, color palette, and other important overall design qualities that are well worth your attention. A question to ask might be: Are there are any icons/insignias that the costume designer is integrating into the costumes that need to be reflected in your artwork? For instance, if is there a sports team that is referred to, you need to work with the costume designer to ensure that any reference to this team and its branding is properly consistent between the costumes and the digital media.

Props

Props are the physical objects in a performance that are held and used by performers onstage. There is typically an individual responsible for the design, construction, and maintenance of the props on a show. On smaller productions, this job can be wrapped into the responsibilities of the scenic designer, costume designer, SM, or any other individual(s) working on the production.

There are a number of exciting opportunities to integrate or embed digital media into physical objects. This is an area that is underexplored and has tremendous potential for exciting new collaborations and modes of storytelling. For instance, if you want to integrate a RFID sensor into a bicycle, the props person can probably help come up with a way to do it. The most common interaction with a props person normally involves diegetic digital media elements that need to be incorporated into an environment. Examples of this are television and other display devices that the characters watch and interact with during a show.

Like the other creatives in this list, getting to the props person early and expressing your needs are vital to success. As mentioned in all other areas of design collaboration, if you need to shoot video of a scene that uses props, you’ll need to clarify expectations and/or negotiate with the team to find a separate props designer for the video shoot and incorporate all props due dates for video into the production calendar.