Thoroughly Modern Martina

Martina McBride goes high-tech on the Waking Up Laughing tour

By Catherine McHugh

Lighting & Sound America

August 2007

Beautiful and bold with a diamond edge, Martina McBride's current Waking Up Laughing tour has a look that's as spectacular and modern as her 2006 Timeless tour was elegant and nostalgic.

Both resulted from the collaborative efforts of production designer Tom McPhillips, of Atomic Design, and lighting designer Abigail Rosen Holmes. Asked simply to do something different and perhaps incorporate video this time out, McPhilllips sought Holmes' advice before he even began sketching. Holmes suggested using transparent LED video screens. "You can put lights behind them and see through them, but you still get full video when you turn them on, so they act like a video scrim," McPhillips says. "That sounded good and suddenly the idea of a louver popped into my mind. That was where it all started from and it just seemed to gel on paper immediately."

From the client to the audience, the consensus agrees that the result is perfect showcase for the charismatic performer. "This is such a beautiful set for Martina," Holmes says. "That video wall so strong visually and that set would dwarf a lot of other performers. We tried to be mindful to make the video a great element without it being distracting, but, because she's so strong onstage, your eye naturally goes to her."

Using 12 of Barco's MiTRIX modules, McPhillips designed a series of motorized video louvers that open and close to reveal graphics and complete video images. Set into a structural grid, which forms a huge curving structure than spans the entire stage, the video louvers wrap around a central rear-projection screen, which is used almost exclusively for IMAG. Based on Atomic's specifications, Nashville-based Setco constructed the hanging/mechanical system for the louvers. "Setco did a fantastic job in pulling off a very tourable and entirely appropriate set," McPhillips says. "And we were incredibly lucky, because they had literally just built frames for another tour using MiTRIX panels, so they'd just sorted out all the little glitches. I also had a curved platform for all the band gear, and Setco made that into a piece of sculpture. It's absolutely beautiful. I was almost surprised that it turned out so well. They absolutely got it." Setco also built the dimensional diamond set pieces that rest on the floor. "The diamond theme came in, as that was the look of the vertical lighting trusses; the idea was that it was all growing out of a cut diamond." McPhillips says. "It's very simple in the end, but very cool. They're aluminum frames with the kind of crumpled screen-door mesh I often use as the filler for the panels between the frames. You can light through it or under it very nicely. So it's like dimensional smoke.

"Of course, I knew that, if it was all going to work, Abbey's lights would have to be functional within the set. I wanted to make sure that she could light it well and also do everything that's necessary and functional-apart from just making it look good, McPhillips says. "That was conceived from the beginning. The most amazing thing was how Abbey took on the process of learning the video. She did a huge amount of work to make it happen, well after the point where it had been designed, and it really shows in the finished product."

Holmes concurs about the work, but she happily took on the role of media content supervisor. "Every now and then, you know from looking at the first drawing that it's going to be a fantastic set to work with," she says, adding "the fundamental look of it is exactly the same as Tom's first drawing."

Holmes enlisted John Martinez, of Los Angeles-based M Design, and Laura Frank, of LuminousFX, who also handled the video programming, to help her create video footage. "Since we were a little short of time, it was nice to have more than one person work on it, but it was also nice creatively, because you feel it in the variation of the imagery. When you have a video element that is such a large part of the show's visuals, it's important to get some depth in how you treat it."

The content was both lyrically motivated and abstract. For example, Martinez made a piece for "This One's for the Girls," featuring images of women of all ages, while Holmes shot falling roses for "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden." For the playful "When God Fearing Women Get the Blues," Frank created a series of multicolored bars going back and forth. Of course, every piece was reworked by Frank in the media server. Holmes discussed everything with the artists and she looked over the footage in development. "Martina's taste in general was for things that were less literal-she preferred more abstract looks, which is appropriate for this kind of low-resolution video wall," Holmes says. "We did make some footage for the RP screen, and there are a bunch of older, filmic pieces that were made for her in the past; they didn't lend themselves well to the MiTRIX panels, so many of them tended to play better on the center project screen."

The show is run on Martin's Maxedia Digital Media Composer media server, although it's not always feeding the images. The center rear-projection screen is also used for image magnification (IMAG) and is controlled by Andre Nolan, McBride's longtime video director. "We send a feed to him some of the time and we take feed from him sometimes," Holmes explains. "For the old-time songs from Timeless, we very consciously used sepia tone images on the screens. That's a perfect example of a filmic image that we're being fed by Andre. We're sending it through the media server, which determines which screens it goes to. One nice thing about MiTRIX panels is that you can manipulate the image, so we were able to make each image feel appropriate, even though the set will never look anything but modern." Holmes again attributes this to the set design: "Tom McPhillips truly outdid himself with this set-one of the most fun things I've gotten to work with in a long time. This is a show for a really strong and powerful woman artist, and yet we still wanted it to feel pretty and it really does." Certainly the right lighting helps accomplish that. "There are some really pretty new songs," Holmes says. "Martina was very involved throughout. We talked about ideas in advance; we had a nice exchange by e-mail and by phone. She looked at lighting cues and really every piece of it. It was a lot of fun. It's completely her show. Plus, this is one of the greatest groups of people to work with-the excellent production, stage management, and crew are what make the wall so easy to tour."

Kille Knobel programmed the lighting with Holmes. The package includes: 56 Martin MAC 2k Washes, 44 Vari*Lite VL3000 Spots, 14 Coemar Infinity Wash XLs, nine VL500s, 150 star strobes, two Lycian M2 Spots, 20 eight-lite Moles, one ETC 48-way Sensor dimmer, one ETC 72-way Sensor dimmer, two MA Lighting grandMA control consoles, two GrandMA NSPs, 20 Coffin one-ton motors and one Bandit 20-way custom motor control.

"We have a lot of Mac 2K washes in the back that provide a nice, beefy wash with enough power to cut through the back of the MiTRIX panels," says Holmes. "One of the most fabulous things about the panels is that they are a fairly open mesh. What makes them so fun is that we have as many looks with the video wall off where you just see the structure of those panels lit. I've also got some of Coemar's Infinity lights-they're quite a new light and have a very powerful tight beam. They do exactly what I'd hoped, which is cut over the top of the video wall, which is not easy to do. And because that beam is so visible in the air when those lights are spotted down, they show up very nicely top of the wall. I also have VL300s because, as compared to other hard-edge lights that were available, they have the power to read over the wall.

"There was definitely a lot of balancing to make everything work together," Holmes continues. "But another nice thing about the layout was that the lighting positions were integrally available as part of the set to begin with. And Tom very kindly made six diamond trusses on the sides to give me nice sidelight positions, too."

Continuing the diamond theme out into the arena, Holmes used a diamond-shaped truss instead of a front straight truss in the downstage center position. "It plays nicely as a scenic element that ties into the back wall, while leaving the back wall open," she explains. "That was a very conscious decision that defines how the show looks."

Many others were involved in realizing the tour, including Conway Allison of Atomic Design (art director), John Martinez of M Design (video content), Trevor Ahlstand (lighting director), Chris Hallman (lighting crew chief), Aaron Swetland and Kenneth "Bubba" Moore (lighting technicians, Tyson Clark (carpenter), Meesa Kosciolek (production manager), Mark Hively (tour manager), and Pat O'Neil (stage manager). Besides Atomic design and Setco, the other suppliers were Moo TV (video gear) and Bandit Lites (lighting equipment).

"Usually you have those ideas and then they fade and you think that would have been great 'if only.' This one was exactly what I designed and it's exactly what turned up on the stage," McPhillips concludes. "I feel very lucky to have been allowed to do it." McBride's tour continues through the middle of August.