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Entertainment Lighting Design
The Great Gatsby
October 2024
McGregor Family Theater, St. Margaret's Episcopal School
Lighting Designer/ Programmer
Password: tartan

Can You See The Green Light Just Across the Bay?
In the dazzling world of 1920s New York, millionaire Jay Gatsby throws lavish parties in hopes of winning back his lost love, Daisy Buchanan, but his pursuit of the American Dream leads to betrayal, illusion, and ultimate tragedy
Production Team
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Director: Daniel Pacheco
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Choreography: Paige Minton
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Scenic: Gordon Richins
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Costuming/Cosmetology: Kirk Kelly
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Lighting: Gavin Shams














Behind the scenes of behind the scenes

Plot Creation
The lighting plot for The Great Gatsby combines a mixture of LED and incandescent units in order to have flexibility with color, while maintaining the quality of light needed in a space that has the actors this close to the audience. For the first time, automated profile units were used in this space. These luminaires allowed not only the ease of changing focus, color, and texture throughout the show. But were a key component to providing the visual aid to important scenes such as projecting an ominous pool that Gatsby would meet his fate in, gobo/ animation wheel rotation simulating movement through the city streets in Gatsby's coupe, as the headlights that Myrtle Wilson would find herself starring helplessley down the center of, or being used for effects during the 2 dance numbers, these fixtures served as way more than just lights in the rig.
Timecode/ Show Control
OSC with EOS and Qlab allowed us to achieve much more complex and intricate sequences with lighting cues. in total, there were 4 separate show control sequences for the opening dance number, the act II opening dance number, Myrtle Wilson getting hit by the car, and with Gatsby's death in the pool.
Before tech, I pre-programmed all these sequences beforehand so we were able to just plug and play when we got into the theater and make any necessary tweaks/ adjustments.



Myrtle Wilson's Death
Gatsby's Death


Act I Opening
Act II Opening



Previsualization
Apart of the process of utilizing timecode sequences in the show was the ability to pre-program these sequences with previsualizstion before even needing to get in the theater. all previsualization was done internally within Eos, utilizing ETC's Augment3d. the previsualization aided the process of not just programming timecode, but also selecting gobos, fixtures, positions, etc...


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