# Peter Pan Projection



## grrjr (Jul 22, 2014)

Hello Everyone!

I'm a drama teacher at a high school directing a production of Peter Pan and Wendy this fall. My background is mainly as an actor/director, not a techie. Unfortunately, I don't have a technical theatre teacher at my school either so everything is up to me. 

For our production, I'd like to be able to use projections (stars, forest, etc.) on our back cyc, but I do not know how to accomplish this. How could I set this up and is there a place for me to be able to purchase the images I'd like to use? Any all advice/recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!


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## ruinexplorer (Jul 22, 2014)

Hello, and welcome to the Booth.

Before we get into exactly what is required to accomplish this, you should have in mind a budget. Video can be quite expensive.

While you are deciding on that, check out my post in this thread, where the OP is looking to do something similar. This will help you understand what goes into planning projection for a production. Also, a wide variety of resources are in our wiki, including this one.

So, questions that will need to be answered:
Do you have any equipment or will you need to acquire everything? Can you rent or do you have to buy? What is your absolute high end budget?
How large of an image do you wish to create?
Do you need projection or can lighting with gobos accomplish what you are looking to do?


There will be many more questions in order to provide assistance once you have figured this out.


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## grrjr (Jul 23, 2014)

ruinexplorer said:


> Hello, and welcome to the Booth.
> 
> Before we get into exactly what is required to accomplish this, you should have in mind a budget. Video can be quite expensive.
> 
> ...



Thank you so much for your response. Rather than using video, I was thinking more along the lines of still images. Even if I can only do a still of stars I'd be happy. I was planning to project onto the cyc, but don't mind if the image isn't crystal clear. I debated using gobos, but am still trying to find a gobo of stars that I like. A lot of them are very cartoonish looking. I attached a photo of the type of stars I'd like.

We already have a projector set up in the mezzanine (if I'm not mistaken, I believe the previous drama teacher used it in shows before). The image itself would need to be about 32 ft wide and roughly around the same height. Our budget isn't huge. When I took over the program last year it was very disorganized and broken. We did The Drowsy Chaperone in the spring, which allowed us to take in a small chunk of money. I'd say I want to try to keep the total show cost under $2000.


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## TheaterEd (Jul 23, 2014)

my go to for stars is several fixtures with This gobo in it http://www.apollodesign.net/Products/View/264.aspx

Overlap several of them, preferably from low angles shooting up and you can get the effect for pretty cheap. Remember, most projectors don't have the power to cut through stage lighting, so you are going to have to keep your stage lights very low if you want this to work.


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## Amiers (Jul 23, 2014)

TheaterEd said:


> my go to for stars is several fixtures with This gobo in it http://www.apollodesign.net/Products/View/264.aspx
> 
> Overlap several of them, preferably from low angles shooting up and you can get the effect for pretty cheap. Remember, most projectors don't have the power to cut through stage lighting, so you are going to have to keep your stage lights very low if you want this to work.



I would run with the star gobos and use this for your forest

http://www.fullcompass.com/product/435843.html

The stars could be setup in an effect cue to give it the twinkle effect. Filling a 32' section for 2000$ is going to be very hard to cut through stage lights but you are in Orlando, so maybe someone will give you a good deal on the cheap as far as a rental.


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## StradivariusBone (Jul 23, 2014)

We do something similar. Our projector is an Epson Powerlite G5950 with a middle throw zoom lens installed. It is permanently hung under our 2nd light bridge and is approximately 40' away from the proscenium wall and about 20' above our stage. Our cyc is about 30' upstage of the proscenium wall so that makes for a throw distance of about 72'. Normally, it's projecting onto a DaLite fastfold screen hung less than 10' back from the p-line, but we had a group rent the place and wanted us to attempt to use the projector as a backdrop like what you want. 

The image is kinda dim and will not compete with a lot of bounce from any of the lights we have for our upstage zones. However, with downstage lighting and carefully chosen downlight, it usually works fairly well. Bear in mind though, the image produced on the cyc is about 25' wide and maybe 18-20' tall. We usually mask the white space by bringing legs in and dropping a border. 

There are many on this board who are much more knowledgeable on projection than I, but I'm guessing to accomplish a 32'x32' image with any reasonable clarity you're going to have to spend a lot of bread on a really powerful projector, or find some way to blend multiple ones together. 

The other issue with using a projector is going to be when you do blackouts. Most projectors will still output some light even when black. This will show up as a square of light during your scene change blackouts. We just finished installing a homebrew dowser built from a CD player to fix this. If you blend projection, this is going to get more complicated. I've done projection on stage before and had a tech just cover the lens with a piece of cardboard during blackouts. Getting multiple ones to do it right will be challenging. 

All told, the projector cost about $6,000 to buy and install. You have to think about where it's going to be hung/placed and also how you're going to drive the slides. Powerpoint, Qlab, etc. And some images may be copyrighted as well. I think now with the dowser we may use this to provide digital backdrops (if you will) for our children's show, since the build for that is usually less than exciting and this may be a way to jazz it up some, but it's just not enough to cut the mustard for anything other than stuff like that. Can it be done? Yes, to answer your question, but not with the projector that was sitting in the conference room or on the media cart. Rental might be an option too, as was mentioned. 

I would second the gobo suggestion. We did that for Aladdin Jr. (children's show) and blended 3 or 4 lekos with star fields for the night scenes. I personally liked this Apollo gobo for the realism. A couple lekos, some good gel and hanging choices and you'll have a huge starfield that will be significantly cheaper than digital projection.


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## TheaterEd (Jul 24, 2014)

StradivariusBone said:


> The other issue with using a projector is going to be when you do blackouts. Most projectors will still output some light even when black. This will show up as a square of light during your scene change blackouts. We just finished installing a homebrew dowser built from a CD player to fix this.



Working in a black box and found out at the last minute that we needed a dowser. I explained my idea to our carp and an hour and a half later he had it built and installed. A piece of plywood bolted to a couple of 2x4s and screwed to the ceiling. 30 feet of tie line later and my projectionist has full control of our DIY dowser.


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## Amiers (Jul 24, 2014)

The theatre consultant that came in 2 years ago had to make a make shift dowser on the fly at the Grammys a few years back with a ceiling tile because the project went buggy and wouldn't dowse.


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## Doowop63 (Jul 24, 2014)

grrjr said:


> Hello Everyone!
> 
> I'm a drama teacher at a high school directing a production of Peter Pan and Wendy this fall. My background is mainly as an actor/director, not a techie. Unfortunately, I don't have a technical theatre teacher at my school either so everything is up to me.
> 
> ...


Rosco image pro will attach to source 4. You can buy slides from them or buy a kit to make your own. Lamp must be 575w or less. I work on a very limited budget $0 and find these work well.


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## ruinexplorer (Jul 24, 2014)

Another option is a slide projector. You can often find them cheap and slides don't cost a ton to make (though maybe harder to find places to make them these days). The Who's Tommy originally used a bank of slide projectors to get the effects for that show. This could allow you the option of multiple images as well.


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