Wieler 6 Daagse in Ahoy

Over het algemeen denk je al snel aan grote artiesten als je denkt aan Ahoy. Een uitverkocht Ahoy wordt immers gezien als een grootse prestatie. Marco Borsato, Gerard Joling, Jan Smit en talloze anderen hebben de afgelopen jaren hun ding mogen doen in de Rotterdamse evenementen hal. Het is dus één van de interessantere locaties om als AV student/medewerker een klus te mogen draaien, zoals ik een tijdje geleden heb mogen doen.

Begrijp me niet verkeerd, de klussen op school in de kantine en de klus in het Gooiland Theater waren natuurlijk ook enorm leuk om te doen. Maar Ahoy is toch net even een stapje hoger. De locatie is groter, het evenement is bekender en de productie in zijn geheel is natuurlijk een stuk complexer en groter dan alles wat ik tot nu toe gedaan heb. En het is natuurlijk altijd leuk om backstage te staan bij dit soort dingen.

“We zoeken nog mensen…”

Zodra ik op mijn school de bovenstaande woorden voorbij hoor komen spits ik altijd even mijn oren om te horen waar het precies over gaat. Het is bij ons op de afdeling niet gek om klussen als grote concerten of voetbal wedstrijden aangeboden te krijgen, maar ik ben niet de enige die op de loer ligt voor dat soort klusjes dus enige scherpte is vereist.

Het geluk stond dit keer echter aan mijn zijde, want er werden mensen gezocht voor een klus in Ahoy en mijn klas werd als eerste benaderd. Simpele keus natuurlijk, dus ik zette mezelf op de lijst om twee daagjes mee te draaien en wachtte af.

Pijn in je schouder

Samen met drie andere klasgenoten ging ik vrijdag richting Rotterdam. De Tom Tom werkte niet helemaal mee en stuurde ons regelrecht door het centrum, in plaats van er om heen, maar uiteindelijk kwamen we waar we zijn moesten; Ahoy, het evenementen pareltje van Rotterdam. Naast De Kuip natuurlijk.

Terwijl we het terrein op reden was het even twijfelen waar de auto moest staan. Toch zeker niet op de publieke parkeerplaats waar het me tien euro zou kosten om een avondje te staan? Welnee, gelukkig had iemand nog zijn pas van de vorige avond bij zich en verschafte ons daarmee toegang tot de VIP parkeerplaats. Dat scheelde mij tien euro, het scheelde ons allemaal een lange wandeling en het is gewoon tof om een VIP te zijn.

Eénmaal binnen kregen we een korte (backstage) rondleiding van Ahoy. Waar de camera’s precies staan, wat er precies staat te gebeuren en wat onze rol daarin gaat worden. Er waren in totaal drie camera’s. Een vaste camera’s die een totaal shot maakte van de baan, nog een vaste camera die shots kon maken van de finish en een schouder camera waarmee we op verschillende plaatsen direct langs de baan konden gaan staan.

Schouder camera’s, of handhelds, bedienen is naar mijn mening een vak apart. Je bent natuurlijk lekker mobiel, maar het stil houden van de camera is niet zo makkelijk als het lijkt. Ook het gewicht, een goede acht tot tien kilo, gaat na een tijdje een flinke tol van je schouder en arm eisen. Het leek me daarom een goed idee om een avond te draaien met de handheld om zo ervaring op te doen en te wennen aan het gewicht. Op school gebruiken we immers soort gelijke camera’s en ik zal ze in de toekomst nog vaak gaan gebruiken.

Ik vond het de leukste en meest indrukwekkende klus die ik tot nu toe heb gedaan. Hieronder staat een rapportage van RTV Rijnmond. De meeste shots van de wielrenners op de baan zijn dus gemaakt door mij en een andere klasgenoten. Al het andere is van RTV Rijnmond zelf.

Robin

Working in the Theater

For the last school year I’ve worked in a few different places, such as the school cafeteria and the atrium in an old Amsterdam monument. However I’ve never done any work inside an actual theater, until last Wednesday. As I might have mentioned before, the media department at my school often helps out the fashion department when it comes to organizing fashion shows and stuff like that. We often build the stage and take care of the audio and lighting.

This year was no different. As usual the students from the fashion department had to organize a complete fashion show for their practical exam assignment, taking care of clothes, make up, music, choreography, you name it. The exam location for fashion changes each year as far as I know and this year the location was the old Gooiland Theater, right here in Hilversum. Great of course, because that makes it really close to home.

The Stage

Since we had exams earlier that morning, me and the classmates who were also coming to help out arrived at the theater around noon. A lot of the work had already been done; moving heads were already in position above the stage, audio equipment was already up and working and they were just about to begin building the primary stage construction. The idea was to create a sort of banana out of cloth on which we could project colors and shapes using a set of 3000 Watt moving heads and another set of 2500 Watt. Needless to say these things emitted a huge amount of light but the effect in combination with the ‘banana’ was very cool to see. My compliments to the stage designers (probably my teachers… cheers!).

The Spotlights

When the stage was done, all lights had been programmed, every cable taped down and everything was working it was time for the waiting game. Most of us hung around aimlessly while the light guys were doing their best to program the light table in time for the big show.

After about an hour the dress rehearsal started and me and a classmate were sent up to the balcony to operate the two spotlights. I’ll tell you right now that being a spotlight operator is not as easy as it looks since you have to try to predict every single move a person is going to make. Especially the first act was hard to follow since it was a sort of African dance, this guy was jumping all over the place. I’m actually glad I got to see it during the dress rehearsal a couple of times otherwise I would have majorly screwed up during the real performance.

In the end we did good though. We got a lot of compliments from people sitting at the Front of House about how good we spotted for a first time which did make me feel good. It’s always nice to be appreciated.

You Break It, You’re Broke

When the show was over and the audience had left the theater the entire crew started to break the stage (which luckily always goes a lot faster then building it). The ‘banana’ was being torn down again, audio equipment packed up and cables rolled up and tossed in crates.

However in our hurry to be done as soon as possible me and one of my teachers kind of forgot that especially the 3000 Watt moving heads might take a while to cool down again. As we lifted one up and tried to tilt it over, the head had a sort of ‘FUCK YOU’ moment and started twisting and turning in all directions, making us lose our balance and almost dropping the damn thing lens down onto the stage. And just to paint a picture, regular 250 Watt moving heads already cost about € 3000,- a piece. These 3000 Watt moving heads cost about € 15.000,- a piece and we almost demolished one. Quick as I am I managed to save it by quickly grabbing the head and holding it up, but that also came at a price. Since the lamp was still hot I received a small yet very painful burn on my hand which proceeded to bleed for the remainder of the evening. But hey, at least I won’t have to cough up my share of 15 grand.

Holland’s Got Talent

A fun fact about this particular theater is that Holland’s Got Talent was done in this very theater, on the very stage we were working on. I generally don’t like those kind of shows though I must admit the *’s Got Talent shows were a lot more amusing than their Idols and Popstars counterparts, mostly because of the live audience present at the auditions.

It was very fun to see and reconize parts of the theater, such as the place where the jury sat and some spots backstage. Check out the video’s and photo’s below and see for yourself.

Final Thoughts

I have to say it was a very fun project to work on. For the first time I’ve actually worked in a theater and also had a chat with people who work there on a daily basis. Speaking to one of the employees really informed me about how things work in an actual theater.

After the stage was clean and everything was loaded up the entire crew had a few drinks in the theater’s bar. It’s fun to be socializing with your teachers after an event like that, especially because you start to know them from a completely different angle. I hope to participate in a few more projects like this next year. For now all I have to look forward to is building and breaking the school dance, but you will read about that next week.

Robin

Photos and Videos

Open School Night

Yesterday my school held an ‘Open School Night’. Basically this is an event that’s organized toward the middle and end of the school year to encourage new students to sign up for next year. I’ve seen about four of these events to this day and in the course of a few years they haven’t changed much. In the main lobby there is a whole bunch of stands with teachers annoyed having to be at school so late, trying to persuade you and your parents to pick that study. At least, that’s what you would expect.

Last year I went to the Open School Night since I was in fact looking to join the Media department. I knew what I wanted, so I had planned to just go there, get what I need and go home. But when I got to the Media stand the first thing I heard was ‘the department is full, we don’t take new registrations. We can put you on the waiting list, though.’.

Really?! If it’s full then why the hell did you put a damn stand there? No way in hell I’m going to wait 2 years to do a damn study. I was twenty for crying out loud. Obviously I did manage to get in eventually, otherwise this blog would be a whole lot of wasted server space.

Anyway, yesterday was no different from the night I had gone there to register. The media hallway (as it is known to most people in the department) had taken every piece of equipment we have from storage to create a very awesome display in our TV studio, obviously meant to show off the kind of stuff we do around here. Absolutely everything was there, from the expensive moving lights to TV cameras and even an auto-cue (I have no clue why we have such a thing at our school). It was very impressive to see when you walked inside, but you couldn’t exactly see anything going on from the main hallway. To solve this, me and a friend from class came up with the idea to set up a simple audio installation in the hallway, indicating to people that something was going on. And it worked, in less then five minutes from setting up we attracted a lot of curious people from down the hall.

We played some music, had two girls from another class do some chit chat over the microphone and generaly just had a good time. That day I think I was at school for a good twelve hours.

Pictures
Taken with the camera phone as usual, excuse the quality.

Robin

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