Tag: scenic design

Prince Caspian Set Design and Build

Photo (c) Dianna Lewis Photography

Prince Caspian played at Gallery 7 Theatre recently. Here are a few pictures of the set design and build process.

It started with a meeting with the director and other designers, reading the script, and coming up with some sketches and ideas which eventually formed the set design.

The forest was built with several different kinds of trees (including by the actors themselves, which were creativily portrayed by the costume designer). I borrowed an idea from Youtube about making the tree canopy out of PVC pipe. I had some scrap ABS pipe and scrounged some other pipes elsewhere; the biggest cost was the 3000 zip ties. The flexible trunks were made of flexible drainage pipe and the big moveable tree was a regular set piece on a riser.

painting by Chris M.

There were also the usual set piece suspects – boxes and furniture…

Several boxes were made by Steve D.
sheet vinyl flooring painted and clear coated
coroplast trees hung on 16′ 1×4 frames
Tree fly painting by Aaren

The big tree was a big undertaking. My dad framed it and I covered it with coroplast and spray foam and a few fibreoptic lights.

Construction by Chris P.
a flashlight provided the light for the fibreoptics here

Load in took awhile, mostly to hang everything from the fly system at Abby Arts. The techs were great.

Actors and crew hanging out on set

And then the lighting designer got to work his magic!

Set by Andrew Potts, Lighting by Ken Hildebrandt, Directed by Gabe Kirkley, Costumes by Kelsey Cleave, Props by Dianna Lewis. For Gallery7Theatre.com.

Building Prop Wine Barrels

For my recent build A Tale of Two Cities for Gallery 7 Theatre, we needed three barrels. One was to be carried and ‘spilled’ and the other two were to set the scene for the Defarge’s wine shop.

A Tale of Two Cities, Gallery 7 Theatre, November 2023

I found a helpful spreadsheet on Popular Machinist (link here) that helped me to know what size to cut the staves. I was able to plug in my dimensions (height, radius, etc) and it plotted out accurate numbers. I then transferred those measurements to a piece of 3/16 mahogany plywood to make a template; then cut all the curved staves with a table saw set at a small angle (please do not attempt to do this unless you are comfortable with power tools).

I cut the head,foot and middle circles out of 3/4 plywood, then stapled the staves on with some help from my assistant. After the first one, I added some extra interior structure before I stapled the staves on, and it was much easier to keep everything even.

There were some small gaps – these would be difficult to make perfect unless cutting everything with a CNC. My solution was 2-inch painters tape to cover the seams and give some structural support.

To protect the top and bottom and also to look more realistic, I added a ring of plywood as well.

My assistant did a great job of painting them and even added some Parisian stamps for realism. The final touch was a few rings of duct tape to simulate metal bands. I also added a few “bung holes” to the prop barrel. One of the larger barrels had a shelf inside so wasn’t completely enclosed, as well.

Overall, they worked really well. They are lightweight, reasonably sturdy, and (I think) realistic. And cheap – I was able to make them for the cost of a couple rolls of tape, since I had plenty of scrap plywood.