Posts Tagged ‘Lighting’

So was the new Doctor Who episode, The Doctor’s Wife, a return to the form of The Impossible Astronaut and The Day of the Moon after The Curse of the Black Spot last week with its rather damp powder?  Would Neil Gaiman writing an episode turn out to be a stunt to promote both the show and the writer?

The action opened with a nice pre-title teaser and didn’t let up till the end credits rolled.  The story cracked along at a great pace with twists and turns along the way.  The story was full of nods to Dr Who Lore while adding a few bits itself around the relationship between the TARDIS and the Doctor.  But, like Idris, I’m getting a bit ahead of myself…

Having a writer as famous as Neil Gaiman write an episode brings both expectations and a certain fear.  Sometimes using big name writers or actors can end up being a stunt when they can’t mesh their ego with a show even one they love as much as fans.  Thankfully Gaiman really knew what a Who episode should deliver and the cast and crew delivered his vision 100%.  He packed in some big ideas, some nods to Who lore, some snappy dialogue, some spills, some thrills and some behind the sofa scares too.

The episodes first big idea was having a villain who feeds on the energy of TARDIS and who lures them in using Time Lord psychic distress messages.  A villain that feeds on TARDIS needs to be a big villain a bloke in a latex mask just wouldn’t have cut it.  So we got an asteroid sized villain who to all intent and purpose was a disembodied villain like Tolkien’s Sauron.  Yet disembodied villains are hard to pull off and can go very badly wrong.  Thankfully House, voiced by Michael Sheen, managed to be threatening through his power to shape other characters environment and play tricks on their minds.  To aid him House had the delightfully gothic, patchwork henchmen Auntie and Uncle along with a bad Ood.

I know some fans would have loved to have seen a 1970s TARDIS control room but I think the choice of the now dusty steampunk one fitted better with the story.  The scratch built TARDIS had the honour of getting elements of one of the shaky set 1970s models and got to shake, rattle, roll, fizz and bang its way along in a rare TARDIS chase sequence.

The Junk World or Plug Hole at the end of the Universe (a lovely line echoing the title of Douglas Adam’s book in the week of the 10^th Anniversary of his untimely death) was wonderfully realised through the set dressed quarry and matte paintings with joins that didn’t show.  The wonderfully theatrical lighting in blues and greens with shafts of light coming from odd angles really worked to create an eerie, gothic feel.

Alongside shooting in a quarry and the use and nods to old control rooms Gaiman snuck in another Doctor Who cliché with the running down the TARDIS corridors.  I find it odd that fans are complaining about using corridor chase scenes in a Doctor Who episode or that they used the wrong corridors.  It almost seems like some people desperately want something to complain about being wrong with the episode.  If the chases were set in rather uniform corridor sets for budgetary reasons rather than in a disused hospital or other location isn’t that in itself a nod to the truth of Doctor Who having to live within its means?

The snappy, dialogue was littered with great lines just casually thrown away like “Another Ood I failed to save”.  Alongside crowd pleasing great lines delivered beautifully like “Fear me I’ve killed hundreds of time lords.” “Fear Me, I’ve killed all of them…”

The second big idea, which according to confidential was the inception of the idea for the story, was personifying the TARDIS  as Idris.  This let Gaiman play with the origin story. The revelations that the TARDIS stole the Doctor so she could see the Universe and that she takes the Doctor to where he needs to be not where he wants to be are great additions to the shows back story.  This could have been a real disappointment but the writing and the acting both hit the mark.

Gaiman laid the foundations with a great deal of restraint and respect.  Suranne Jones played the part beautifully moving through confusion to acceptance, to understanding and finally to dying.  Along the way delivering some great moments with the Doctor.  By not being entirely tied to linear time even when trapped in a body gave Idris an otherworldly quality. Knowing what people are going to say and do, archiving things that haven’t happened yet.  There was a real intimacy to her relationship with the Doctor the TARDIS really is the Doctor’s Wife and that relationship is complicated. Yet she wasn’t just about big ideas and back story she had nice human moments vanity on seeing herself in a mirror; thinking Rory is the pretty one.

There are some really great lines between the Doctor and Idris but I’ll pick one “I exist across all space and time.  You talk and run around; bring home strays” sums up the show so well.

So inevitably we come to the end of the ride that has had Amy and Rory in jeopardy with first of being eaten and then from a bad Ood and a disembodied threat that plays with the TARDIS and inside their heads. That great Doctor Who cliché of running down identical corridors turner on its head to be a great asset with interesting and scary stuff happening in the corridors.  Meanwhile the bubble universe will reach absolute zero in three hours and Idris dying.  Yet working together The Doctor, Idris, Amy and Rory manage to see off the Ood and the House.  Leaving Idris / TARDIS one last moment for Gaiman’s gothic sensibility “‘Alive.’ I’m alive.” And  after a bit of fun interplay and underlining the new addition to this series’ mystery the last scene a moment between The Doctor and a set, sorry the TARDIS, there aren’t many shows that could have an actor playing to the set as a character.

So if you’ve not guessed yet I think Gaiman, cast and crew have pulled off a top notch Doctor who that worked really well and was also good, old fashioned fun.

Before I go we got one obvious addition to the Series 32 / Series 6 mysteries list:

• The only water in the forest is the river.

Not really a lot to go on there – River may be River Song and a library is a dead forest where River was left in virtual form at the end of Forest of the Dead or I could be reading far, far too much into one line.

Last night I started messing around with a picture I was messing around with in Vue 7. I was never 100% happy with the lighting of the original. The monster was too visible – I wanted it to be lurking and menacing. Now Vue 9 has the wonderful new relighting feature so I made a small render of the scene and then saved out 21 variations. I varied the lighting seven different levels of intensity. I also varied the sunlights colour to a blue and a green hue from the white it was in the original. To illustrate the effect here is a quick contact sheet I knocked up.

These two are late additions suggested by @WastexGames…

Sea Monster Variations Orange

Sea Monster Variationsv - Red

I’m torn over which one to go with so here is a quick poll that will run till Sunday night to see what you think (or leave a comment if you’d prefer) – you can pick more than one picture if you like several.

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It’s that day of the week again.  Here is my 8th updated Vue lighting rig which this week uses two lights shining horizontally on a figure.

I saw the most astonishing arse today.

No stop it.

I don’t normally comment on such things.  I’m a gentleman who keeps such thought private while others utter them without the aid of a quantity of strong drink.

Stay with me a little there is a point to all this.  It might even relate to tonight’s entertainment by the extraordinary Mr Stephen Fry.

It belonged to a young lady (the bottom that is) and was clad in tight white jeans and it was moving at speed through, appropriately, the Power Hall at the Science Museum.  I suspect she was in some way involved in the private event in the area of the museum that was closed.

The thing about the arse in question is that it was tight, pert, perfectly formed and had two exceptional halves.

That is also a good description of Mr Fry’s show.

It had other qualities.  It was quite clearly structural.  The young lady in question reminded me of a Radio Four Afternoon Play I heard while holidaying in my teenage years in Yorkshire.  An architect told the story in the first person.  He described his lover in terms of elements of classical architecture.  In this case her legs, like Corinthian columns, were connected to her finely tapered torso by the ornate capital that was her arse.

While a slightly wandering (although not Corbutesque) monologue the evening’s entertainment was similarly well structured.  There were anecdotes, answers to questions, personal insights and jokes.  There were impressions and a hint of technology without slipping into modern, ancient or Koine Geek.  His beta software didn’t crash embarrisingly.

There was laughter.  I’ve been struck on this trip to London how laughter can be so varied.  I’ll come back to that in another post.  I’m wandering away from the main point (if well muscled twin hemispheres can be a point) which isn’t really the very exception glutæus maximus anyway.

Meandering even further from the arse briefly I must comment on the footwear.  Good footwear is important.  It acts as a sound foundation for the support of the legs and on up to the…

Now really do I have to tell you again?

…top of the head.  It can also encourage the arse to wiggle in a most pleasing manor.  The young lady in question had a rather fine pair of black, or possibly extraordinarily dark brown, patent leather boots with unexceptional heals and turnovers at the top.  Maybe a hint of the pirate about them.  Or more than a month of my salary.

Mr Fry’s show had similarly well prepared footwear.  The lighting was simple, tasteful and focused the eye on the stage.  At first I thought the screens might be a little small but I realised they were in fact perfectly choosen to supplement his performance rather than replace it.  The choice of (I think) mostly ‘50s music before and during the interval between part A and part 2 put a little swing into the proceedings.  The quality of the audio throughout was pleasing on the ear.  I feel it’s important to mention such things having been to concerts ruined by a sound system, to strain the analogy well past the point of good manners, consisting of a single, broken down, flip flop and a high heeled wellington boot caught in a crack in the paving of acoustical amplification.

Now the arse (there I’ve used the word three five times in one post which is five times more than the proceeding thousand and something posts on Too Many Ideas) may have been clad in perfect, tight, white jeans but it had hidden depths.

No really stop it.  Don’t make me delete this post because you can’t behave.

That white fabric was of such a fine weave that it was absolutely clear that something black was under it.  Not some sort of indiscreet thong above the waist or visible fabric line.  No this was a black something that may well have begun at the neck and gone all the way down into the boots.  If it did I hope she didn’t need to make too many trips to the toilet on work time.  It may have been in two pieces.  My apologies I was distracted by the demonstration of complex oscillations.  Quite possibly it would have been more appropriate on the third floor in amongst the machines for examining harmonic motion.

And yes (and I’m not going to apologise for starting a paragraph with an and) Mr Fry’s talk had hidden depths.  There were moments of poignancy and his thoughts on Wilde were an excellent (almost) end to the show.  The fine white weave of light humour and a rather funny short story covered another layer, that was not dark but simply not what I was necessarily expecting of the evening.

Now I didn’t want to give too much of the excellent evening’s entertainment away.  I don’t know how much of the upcoming shows will be similar or if there will be a future broadcast, DVD or wax cylinder release that I could spoil.   Hopefully my comparison of a rather extraordinarily sublime arse and Mr Fry’s fun little talk will suffice.  I could certainly have watched either of them for significantly longer than the duration of the show provided.

As always (at least when I remember) a quick one line summary: Mr Stephen Fry’s one man show is a wonderful way to spend an evening.

Oh and if the lady in question should by some strange twist of fate see this: my apologies, this really is a moment of madness and poor taste. But good grief you do have an exceptional behind.  How many hours of step do you do to keep it in such fine shape?

Here is the now regular update for a Tuesday of one of my old Vue lighting rigs: tonight’s features Spotlights at 45 degrees from the Front and Back.

I’ve just posted my latest revised theatrical lighting rig tutorial for Vue… Two Spots 45 Degrees From the Side.

I’ve just posted my latest revised theatrical lighting rig tutorial for Vue… Two Spots Slightly to the Side.

Just finished rendering fresh images for a revised version of my fourth theatrical lighting rig tutorial.

I’ve posted the third revised lighting tutorial tonight ~ Single Spot Slightly Behind.

I’ve updated the second of my old theatrical lighting rig tutorials tonight: Vue Lighting Rig: Single Spot Slightly to One Side with fresh renders and some small revisions to the text.