How To Make A Set Design For A Play

Show artwork for The set design process — Berlin set model by Christina Smith.

Education

The gear up design process

Berlin

Christina Smith explains the process of designing the set for Berlin by Joanna Murray-Smith.

The set design process at MTC typically takes ix months, from the initial parameters briefing through to opening night. Gear up and costume designer Christina Smith explains how the Berlin set up evolved from folio to stage.

PARAMETERS BRIEFING

When I am offered a chore to design at MTC, the offering generally comes with the following parameters:

WHO: always the director (as it is the director who nominates their preferred designers), but sometimes also naming the other members of the creative team or bandage.
WHAT: the play text and playwright.
WHERE: the venue that the production will take identify. This is absolutely essential information - Berlin would have looked quite different in the Fairfax Studio.
WHEN: the parameter of time is very of import, as it not only tells me if it will fit into my schedule (as a freelancer I accept many dates in my calendar) but how long I have to conceive the design and get the set built. This involves knowing my deadline dates.
HOW: what are my resources? What is the upkeep? Who are the personnel involved? (east.g. Will information technology be manufactured in house, and if so, how much time take I been immune? Or will the build be outsourced?)

Often, the parameters refer to how you lot can utilize the venue, such as the use of the thrust stage. Berlin is unusual in that we have been able to venture out across the proscenium, and this was just due to the managing director's initial instinct that this play needed to have an intimacy that is not afforded to working behind the frame of the proscenium. Ordinarily, designers are frequently discouraged from using the thrust due to the amount of seats that need to be lost from the venue and the impact on box office.

SCRIPT BREAKDOWNS

I'll always commencement my procedure with an initial read of the script. This is ideally done in one hit so that I can experience it in 'real time' (much as an audition would). I likewise take the opportunity afterwards to accept down some initial 'gut responses' in a new notebook (frequently on the first page) that I will use right up until opening night. I notice it helpful, especially if I am always feeling a piffling lost in the process, to look dorsum at my initial notes to recall those immediate instincts - they are then oftentimes right!

The second read involves me taking copious notes almost the structure, movements of the characters, furniture and props. Information technology is a real 'breaking downwardly' of the text, enabling me to empathise how it works and what it asks for. At this stage, initial conceptual thoughts or imagery often beginning to arise, and I record these too.

I'll meet with the managing director for the first time after my initial or second read of the text. I want to exist sure that I know the text well enough to talk it through, but I don't want to be much further along than that. Whilst it is important that I communicate my responses, it is important that I go to that first word with an open heed. For this reason, I volition not accept undertaken any visual research or done whatever sketches - I actively restrain myself from imagining what the space might exist similar.

Pages from Christina Smith's notebook showing script breakdown.

Pages from Christina Smith's notebook showing script breakup.

Above are pages from my notebook. On the right mitt side I write information from the text, and on the left hand side I record thoughts as they come to me. 1 stands out from this page: "The apartment is history" - an early on observation that made it through to the final iteration of the blueprint.

INITIAL REFERENCES

I have a colleague where I teach at the VCA who instructs her students to enquiry 'similar a spider'. I've always loved this visual image - whether you imagine legs branching out from a body or the idea of casting a wide web - as it indicates the various paths you lot need to venture down in order to empathise and investigate the core question (i.due east. the text).

My research will therefore fork out into many different directions. For Berlin, my visual research led me to modern Berlin apartments, older Berlin compages, landmarks such as the Clärchens Ballhaus mentioned in the script, photographs of post war devastation, film noir, and visual artists such as Cornelia Parker and Gordon Matta-Clark among other areas. I collect these images in Milanote, an online tool for organising creative projects, and share this with the other creatives and eventually MTC staff.

INITIAL SKETCHES & MODEL

These are early sketches from my notebook. On the left is my first scribble, trying to understand the floorplan necessary to brand the action in the text piece of work. On the right is the birth of the blueprint - the idea of the 'sandwich', fragments suspended betwixt a historic floor and ceiling. This was the first and last pages of sketches in my book, every bit I generally motility to the model very rapidly.

Early on 'sketch' model by Christina Smith.

In the gallery higher up you tin also encountera very early 'sketch' model. I like to sketch initial ideas in 3 dimensions every bit I feel I can answer to the space in a much more authentic way. The black surround you lot can see is the model box of the Sumner Theatre - information technology is vital to have the parameters of the venue as a starting signal. The model is to scale (1:25), only these 'sketches' are very rough and quick as I need to be able to modify them easily every bit I work through the various iterations.

PRELIMINARY DESIGN

Pictured below is a white card model, now often known as a preliminary model. It is traditionally done in white menu, though many designers (including myself) volition often work in colour at this phase. Whilst information technology is preliminary, it is to scale and is an accurate representation of the intended blueprint in the venue. There should be plenty information for the design to exist costed at this stage, as the feasibility of the fix in regards to price, build time and safety will be determined from this model. It is accompanied past a scale plan and section (a cut through side view that shows heights) in guild to assist with accuracy and clarity

In the gallery above yous'll also meet coloured renderings, which I oftentimes include alongside the white model in order to betoken colours and finishes. This is not only for the costing, but for the director and myself to see how the concluding version may await.

I do my renderings digitally, working over the meridian of the white model photo past collaging photographic and textural elements. I enjoy working digitally as it is very fast and malleable - I am able to experiment with colour and texture in a much quicker mode than if I were using traditional painting or drawing methods. I use the method to explore possibilities, not just to document a realised idea.

Blueprint STUDIO

Once the preliminary design has been approved I have admission to the MTC Design section, and nosotros are all focussed on working out the logistics of the design - how it will be manufactured and installed.

Most valuable to me during this fourth dimension is admission to the draftsperson - it is with them that the details of construction are worked through and communicated to the workshop who will build the set. I am also asked to lock in finishes such as floor and sometimes furnishings, though I observe this especially challenging at this stage as I am often nevertheless to complete the final model. I make a lot of discoveries during this terminal phase, with some elements in flux right up until the final design deadline.

Detail of the Berlin set plan (aerial view). CAD drawing past Jacob Battista.

Detail of the Berlin section drawing (side view). CAD drawing by Jacob Battista.

Last Pattern

Below is the finished 1:25 calibration colour model. This is the final iteration of the design for the Visitor, and is complete with paint finishes and piece of furniture. Information technology is a tool used by many dissimilar areas of the company:

the designer uses the model as a testing ground for ideas and a communication tool to relay their intentions.
the managing director uses it to visualise the space (as exercise the actors), and too to experiment with staging potentials. The model often lives in the rehearsal room for as long as possible for this reason.
the workshop uses it to visualise the build, though they work from technical drawings rather than the model every bit the drawings are far more accurate (there is a lot of room for error at this scale).
the breathtaking artists utilize it as their primary document from which to reproduce the paint finishes on the set.

This photo is taken to replicate the view from a seat at the front of the auditorium. Set model past Christina Smith.

This photo demonstrates a sightline from the dorsum row of the auditorium. Gear up model by Christina Smith.

Detail of the 1:25 model being built. The herringbone floor has been laser cut from plywood, and each board is stained to different levels in order to provide variation in the floor. Photo: Christina Smith.

Detail of the 1:25 model being built. The ceiling is made from cardboard, with polyfilla to add texture. The ceiling rose is comprised of 3 pieces of jewellery stuck together. A layer of gesso binds it all together, and and so information technology is painted with several washes of color. PHOTO: Christina Smith.

Along with the model, a final plan and section are produced, as well every bit working drawings that detail every element to exist built with dimensions.

MANUFACTURE

At MTC the manufacture flow is often before rehearsals have commenced. I come up in periodically during this time in order to observe the build. There are oftentimes questions to exist answered and challenges to be solved. It is an exciting time to come across information technology all come together in 1:one scale. Below is an image from the paint flooring, showing the item of the scenic painting on the ceiling piece. I was very happy with the effect of this, cheers to the Breathtaking Art department!

Scenic painting of the Berlin ceiling. Photograph: Christina Smith.

REHEARSALS

I'k around regularly during rehearsals, and endeavor to maintain a daily contact with the rehearsal room. Information technology is important to understand how rehearsals are progressing, and what the requirements of the room are. Regardless of how well you 'plan' a design, theatre is a collaborative process and the real cosmos begins on the rehearsal room floor with the performers and the director. Discoveries are fabricated and ideas evolve, and it is a large function of my job to ensure these needs are met.

Nigh of the props sourcing is done during this time, and I need to provide guidance on what is to be sourced. Similarly, much of the costume purchase/manufacture also occurs over the rehearsal menstruation due to the performers beingness available.

Michael Wahr and Grace Cummings in rehearsal. PHOTO: Charlie Kinross.

Michael Wahr, Grace Cummings and Iain Sinclair in rehearsal. PHOTO: Charlie Kinross.

The Berlin cast and creative team in rehearsal. Photo: Charlie Kinross.

BUMP IN

I'm in the theatre for the crash-land-in of the fix up until the show opens, including all the previews. Fifty-fifty though the fix has been expertly built equally designed, there are notwithstanding decisions to be made (often chop-chop) as information technology goes into the venue. For example, I made a snap decision on the first mean solar day to raise the downstage bespeak of the ceiling higher than planned - this was to arrange sightline for the back row. The collaboration also continues amongst the creative team, primarily focussing on lighting and audio decisions that sculpt the mode the show is presented.

Touching up the joins in the ceiling before it flies out. PHOTO: Christina Smith.

With the ceiling flown out, the build tin can commence underneath. Photo: Christina Smith.

The forestage and mezzanine under construction during bump in. Photograph: Christina Smith.

PERFORMANCES

My contract officially ends on opening night, so I have very picayune to do with the shows running later that betoken. I receive prove reports that update on how the show is running, and if something isn't quite working I'm consulted every bit to the method to rectify it. For case, there was some liquid spillage that was occurring during the show that had the potential to damage the stock gauze in the venue. In club to prevent this, a protective flat was installed - I was informed of the possible solution and was able to approve it once I knew it did not touch on the artful of the prove.