Week 4

Things were starting to get rather hectic this week! We finished the maze, the towers and one of the village scene flats woo! I would have liked some more of the other village scene flats to have been completed this week but as construction are falling a bit behind schedule I decided there was no loin in working late this week.

For a couple of days this past week we had 3 first year technical students in the department. To be honest I was unsure how enthusiastic they would be but it turned out they were so much more willing to give everything 100% compared to the first year applies artists that came in last week!

Things i have found difficult this week is give people direction, I don't want to be harsh or to upset people, but sometimes I'm thinking in my head 'please look at the model, does that look like the model?!' However, things are just following as manager. Still have a few colours to mix but all the next pieces from construction seem pretty straight forward to paint.

Ah eep, the worst thing that happened this week was running out of white paint! Must make sure I'm on top of how much white paint we are using!

Perspective Painting

I've given up for today, my mind is frazzeled and the thought of all the detail in my perspective painting is driving me mad.

I worked for several hours on my painting today, however I feel little has changed and this had left me in a bad mood! I'm finding how to approach my painting extremely hard. Usually when I paint at home I have a palette and mix all my colours on that, but I'm trying to approach my painting in the scenic art way which means having all my colours mixed up! Having all my colour mixed up is annoying, as sometimes I'm like there is the tinnsiet bit of this colour here and small bit of that colour there ... ARGHAJKLS Why did I pick such a hard picture?

Well actually I chose to do this perspective painting as everything I have painted so far has been extremely flat (i.e. all 2D) and I feel this painting will test my limits, so I really want to get it done and be proud that I've pushed myself.

Week 3

This week went so quick! We got the rest of the floor finished, got the flats in from construction and started painting! I would have liked to of worked a little bit quicker, but seeming as this week was meant to be a total write off as we were all originally scheduled in for 3 paint calls down at the main building, I think we made up for it!

Maze Scene

During this term, not only is the Conservatoire putting on the production of Beauty and The Beast, but there also various other shows being put on such as 'Tartuffe' and the 'Importance of being Earnest'  which had paint calls scheduled for this week. As we had four first years coming into the Scenic Department this week I suggested to Gary that he took them down to the paint call with the second years, while us third years stayed up at SLS and worked on panto.

After finishing the floor and priming the flats, Lee, Rose, and Jude got on to drawing up the Village Scene flats ... it took a bit longer then I would have liked due to some mistakes and some people being off, however by Friday it was great to see paint on them.

CSL Village Flat

Perspective Village Flat

Friday was a very stressful and hectic day for me, there were no more paint calls scheduled so I had 9 people (4 of them first years) all needing jobs ... I was having kittens trying to find jobs for everyone. However, I managed to find something for everyone to do. Jude, Rose, and little Rosie started painting the village flats. The first years finished drawing up the palace gates and started painting the maze scene and the sweetie truck. Lee nearly finished painting the US (upstage) Towers and I helped with the maze scene.

Sweetie Truck

Towers

Hopefully by Wednesday next week the village flats and the Maze Scene will be finished, and then we can start painting and drawing up the palace. 

Maze Scene

EEP.... OH MY ONLY 3 WEEKS LEFT OF PAINTING.

Week 2 - Maze

During the second week there was only the need for 4 people to work on the floor at one time, so I had

to find jobs for those who came off the floor for the rest and a job for myself. Other jobs that week included more drawing and more colour mixing - which was all a great plus as this means when we start getting more work in from construction we can start painting straight away!

One of the other jobs I started was the sample of the trees for the 'Maze Scene,' in this scene in the pantomime is where the loved up couples come to light. In the designers model piece, the leaves of the hedges are painted in water colour effect, however Gary (my tutor) asked the designer (Robin Peoples) if we could do the leaves in heart a shape which the designer thought was a great idea. As Rose didn't have a job to do she helped me create 3 sizes of a heart shape stamp. Basically we cut out hearts from a foam sponge, glued it to a piece of wood a created a small handle for each stamp. 

Creating the overall look to the hedges proved much more difficult then I first thought. I had to create 3 dimensional effect using the 3 colours (a bright green, dark green and mid green), eventually after several attempts as well as fixing the original colours  (and lots of helpful advice from Gary) I managed to create a look for the tree that worked. 

Week 2 - the floor

Wahoo! Feeling a lot better about this week, I feel I am settling into my management role, but once again still feel like I'm not doing all of a great job. I guess I'm just uncertain how people are perceiving my managing, I don't want to be like a dictator but at the same time I don't want people to think I have no clue what's going on.

Floor Sample

This week our main task was to get the floor finished (we almost did, just a little more to do on Tuesday!) as it takes up most of the space in paint shop. The annoying thing about the floor was that it was too large to put down as one piece so we i had to do it in four sections. Doing the floor in four sections meant we had to fade the colour out gradually so that when we put the floor together it all came together as one. I mainly let Rose and Jude take charge of the floor as Rose had done the samples, and Jude was all ready confident at using the spray gun after using it a lot on her personal project. Gillian was great and picked up the knack of using the gun quickly, she was also extremely enthusiastic which was great. Rosie also did a great a job and Lee was much more confident at using the gun by the end of the week.

The floor was pretty hard to paint at the beginning, I was convinced there were 4 colours used in the model piece but Gary assured me there was only 3 (blue, light blue and pink) and that the blue and the pink optically mixed together to create the purple colour.

End Of Week 1

At the end of my first week as being head scenic artist on the pantomime I was still feeling overwhelmed. I had a breakdown in my tutorial which was rather embarrassing and I felt I was still not living up to Sarah Crooks who was the head scenic artist on the pantomime last year. I didn't feel I was 100% organised, or new exactly what to do. I found it hard to make sure everyone had a job, knew how and what to draw up. Looking back I wish I had clearly told everyone how to label the back of the flats and I wish I could just be confident to be like 'please work a tad faster!'

Colour Mixing for the floor

During the first week we got a lot of drawing up done, which was a big task achieved as the quicker we drew up the flats - the quicker we would get the flats back from construction to paint. The second years (Rosie and Jillian) did a great job seeming they hadn't done much before! Lee (a fellow third year) was a whiz kid, he's really good at maths and I think his brain works more logically then mine and was drawing up flats like they were going out of fashion. Jude did some drawing up but she along with Rose had the fun and challenging task of mixing up colours! I think Rose found the colour mixing for the floor rather hard, and so did myself. However thankfully by the end of the week we finally got all three colours mixed, and started priming the floor.

Priming the floor!

Too Much Information

What a jump! Two days into third year and I am having kittens, well a litter to be honest. I know obviously every year gets harder but I feel it's all going too fast. I'm getting increasingly scared about everything - especially my 'Negotiated Project' as I have to make a module briefing paper to be handed in just over a week.

I'm happy though that there seems to be a bit more structure and organisation this year. Yesterday we got handed folders outlining our pathways for this year, I feel I will use this so much more then moodle as it's so much closer to my fingertips then the Internet!

Well back to the Negotiated Project, I'm hoping to do personal projects every Monday to enlarge my portfolio as I feel I never have time to fit in personal projects. Obviously I always prioritise production work during term time so I feel my the development of my other scenic art skills are affected as I don't get a proper devoted chance to strengthen them! So tonight while I try to go to sleep I'm going to put my thinking hat on so that I can get my module briefing done and dusted by the weekend!

First Day of Third Year

Eeep yesterday has made me even more scared about this year. We had several meetings yesterday briefly telling us about the year ahead, to be honest I sat there in a daze thinking about schedules, times, work load etc ...

Went up to SLS yesterday as the paint arrived woo!

I also met up with Gary when i was there as I had a few hours off between lunch and my last meeting, so we started the schedule for panto. I was putting on a brave face but I'm scared I won't live up to Sarah Crooks, i'm scared its all going to go wrong and that I'm not going to be good at explaining stuff.

So last night when I got in from uni I started the schedule, however my excel on my MacBook was playing up and I thought - great, if I don't get this done it's going to make me look really bad!!! Thank god my sister has a really old Windows computer with excel on it and it worked a treat!

I went to bed last night feeling knackered, I also felt sort of sluggish as I didn't have a chance to go to the gym as I was too busy. So instead I did an hour of Pilates. I think prioritising and making time for the things I love doing are all going to be effected this term, I love the gym and I love socialising. However I know these two things are going to have to take a back seat during panto as I just want to give it my all. Well rant over off to a meeting!