Transforming Pieces

John Weiker from Grace Church Bath Campus in Akron, Ohio brings us this awesome segmented design.

From John: Our summer set had to meet a couple requirements, cover the full stage, provide pleasing camera angles across the entire stage, and not contain a defined design that allowed people to see different thing each time they looked at the set.

The set was made of only four things, 1/2in plywood, 2×4’s, 2×6’s, and 1/4in foam. The set in the main room consisted of nine panels that at 4ft wide and 14.5ft tall. On the back side, you have a 2×6 joining the two sheets of ply together and then there is an angle brace that goes into the bottom of the structure that we then screw directly into the stage, and then have an aircraft cable going to the ceiling to prevent the panel from falling forward if something were to happen to the panel. The panels in the other room are only 12.5ft and do not have the back brace.

The design is then measured out onto 1/4in blue foam. The three different colors that the foam is painted in will signify how far that piece is mounted off the plywood. The lightest blue is screwed directly to the plywood, the next darker is mounted onto 3in standoffs and then the darkest blue is 6in off the plywood. The standoffs are made of cut sections of 2×2.

We cut a pair of blocks that allowed us to evenly space out all of the foam 6in from each other while the foam was up on its standoffs.

The lights on the top of the set are American DJ Mega Tri Par Profiles with their bracket screwed directly into the plywood and into the 2×4 on the back side. We started the with the lights being aimed straight down at the stage floor and then they were fanned out to soften the beam and prevent having a very defined beam on the foam. There are three of the par lights and they are placed one every three feet and 3in from the top. The design stops 6in from the top of the wood and the last 6in is pained black to hide the light. On the floor, we have an American DJ Mega Bar shining up onto the set.