Member Article

Blinded by the lights!

With Simon Raybould of Curved Vision

It might not happen to you, but it might just… you’re called on to give a relatively big presentation and they tell you that there will be plenty of light - a spotlight on you, even. Wow. You can’t fail to be seen - after all, they’re shining a big, bright light at you…

If only it was that simple!

If you ever find yourself in the position of standing in the light (you might hear it being called “hitting your spot”) you’ll find it’s not as easy to do as you think, unless you know what’s what. Here are a few simple tips.

Mark it - if you have the luxury of having rehearsal time, ask for the light to be put on and get someone in the audience to tell you when you’re in the right place (for your face to be seen particularly). Then take a tip from professional actors and ‘spike’ your spot. That is, use a piece of coloured electrical tape to mark the place on the floor where your toes should go. If you’re on a raised plinth so the audience can’t see it, you can even make it brightly coloured to make things easier in the heat of the moment.

Feel the heat - before you start to speak, take a moment to concentrate on the heat of the light - if it feels warmer or brighter on one side than the other, move towards that side. Your audience will wait: even if they notice the time you spend doing this, they’d rather see your face than not, believe me! (As a crude aside, by the way, the better you can see the audience - for spotlights coming at you from the front, this is - the less well they can see you: actors can’t see their audience at all!)

Use your head - Concentrate on getting your head lighted. Unless you’re used to it, people have a tendency to walk into a spot of light on the floor and stand in the middle of it. Unfortunately, unless the spot is very big (and by this I mean too big!) doing this means your head will be out of the top of the light and you’ll look daft. Instead, resist your instinct, and move so that your feet are at the very front of the light. That way your head will more likely be in the middle of it.

As always, questions, comments and training requests to me on sme@curved-vision.co.uk. It’s always good to hear from people.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .