Cassandra Phillips: Scenic Artist
 
The Music Man has a treatment of very accentuated wood grain.  To accomplish this, we have bought a foam substance with low-relief wood grain pressed into it.  We have been using dremel tools to carve a deeper grain into the foam.  It has been a fun but trying process at times, and quite messy! 
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Here is a detail shot of the wood grain carved into the foam before it has been primed and painted.  

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Messy!

 
Here at the festival, the Randal shop has been working the traditional post-load-in night calls of midnight to 9am.  We have been really productive and Katie is very proud of our work.  The company is good, the music is good, and we are getting excited as things start to come togeather.
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Here Jen is carrying out a stucco treatment on the stage left wall of the Noises Off set.  

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The upstairs walls are covered in a multi-colored wallpaper.  To do this, we frisketed the walls and then covered them with photocopies of the pattern.  We then cut out two color-shapes at a time and airbrushed each color as we went.

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Here you can see the pattern and the cutting of the shapes.

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We also had a little fun with the shapes we cut out. 

 
The Music Man has a train car in its first scene that needs to be grained in a fine and bright but used-looking wood grain.  I was given the opportunity to lead this project.  
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Here I am pulling a grain on the floor of the train car.  

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Here is the sample i have created for the train car. 

 
Noises off calls for a  dimensional rock wall, so Jen and I got to carve it!   It is supposed to look like that rock wall we've all seen in someone's basement.  Sort of rounded rocks but with some facets to them.  
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We cartooned the rock shapes onto pink polystyrene. We tried several tools to try to make our lives easier-  A grinder, a wire brush attachment on a drill-  But they were all hard to control for the small spaces in between the rocks, and we decided to go with an olfa knife and shurforms.  

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Because we were making such a mess, we got to take the walls outside and carve in the mild weather and with the view of the mountains in the background.  

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Unfortunately, we won't get to see the finished product for a little while, as we have to move on to other projects.  We'll finish these rocks in space.  For now they are coated in white jaxsan.  

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Meanwhile, Katie, Natalie and Kelsey have been working on this drop for Glass Menagerie.  The show is set in St. Louis, where apparently there used to be a lot of wooden fire escapes.  The drop is supposed to look like a crowded jumble of these fire escapes and is seen through a small sliver opening in the set.  It is translucent and relatively small- about 23' x 16'.  I had the opportunity to help cartoon and shadow this beast.  


Cassandra Phillips: Scenic Artist