The Prop Effects Guidebook

Lights, Motion, Sound, and Magic

Eric Hart

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351395489
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Médias et arts de la scène
• Subtopic: Théâtre

In The Prop Building Guidebook, author Eric Hart demonstrated how to cut, glue, sculpt, and bend raw materials to build props. Now in The Prop Effects Guidebook, he shows us how to connect and assemble components and parts to make those props light up, explode, make noise, and bleed. It delves into the world of electricity, pneumatics, liquids, and mechanical effects to teach you how to make your props perform magic in front of a live audience. The book is complemented by a companion website featuring videos of how to create individual prop special effects: www.propeffectsguidebook.com.

one
designing, prototyping, testing

Some trick props are straightforward and can be solved by duplicating an existing solution: adding an electric candle to a lantern, running water to a sink, or making a breakaway glass. Other trick props can be more complex, either because the effect needed is out-of-the-ordinary, or because the context of your production prohibits more traditional solutions. This book provides the building blocks for potential solutions, but you will need to design, prototype, and test the actual prop by yourself.

When approaching a trick prop, many prop builders follow a process similar to the following:

1. Define the Problem
2. Specify Requirements
3. Research and Brainstorm Solutions
4. Develop a Solution
5. Build a Prototype
6. Test and Redesign

You do not always need to follow these steps in order or do each one. You can design something, test it, and find a problem, then return to an earlier step for modifications. Let’s look at each step in turn.

Define the Problem

The first step with any prop effect is to define the problem. Gather as much information as possible from the beginning. The script has clues as to what the prop needs to do. The director and designers will have ideas about the trick prop as well. Always talk to them first as they may deviate from the written stage directions.

They may be vague (“the piano should be a bit magical”) or they can be specific (“we want the front leg of the stool to break when he sits on it”). When discussing the trick, use this time to further define what exactly is needed (“does he need to be able to sit on the stool before the moment it breaks?”). If you have an idea that requires them to stick to a certain plan, bring it up now (“if the exploding clock is hung on the upstage wall, we can have a crew member trigger it manually from behind”).

Figure 1-1 This magical music box needed to light up on the inside and have a puff of smoke emerge on cue. The crank on the front needed to be turned by the actor as well as move on its own. The whole thing had to be cued from the light board as dancers carried it all around stage. That is a lot of magic for the box, but once the problem is fully defined, it can start to be broken down into individual challenges.

Specify Requirements

Once you have exhaustively described what your trick prop needs to do, you should have a list of requirements you need to meet. If a solution does not meet all of those requirements, then you need to improve the solution or come up with a different one.

In the world of live performance, a prop effect will have additional considerations which may or may not have been discussed in your meetings with the director and designers:

1. Reliability
2. Reset Time
3. Cost
4. Triggering
5. Back-up Plan
6. Sightlines

Reliability – You want your effect to work each and every time it is used, and you want it to act the same way whenever used. Sure, in live theatre, something will go wrong every once in a while: cues are called late, actors misplace a prop, and raccoons run across stage. If your effect fails because of a freak accident, that’s fine, but if it fails because it was built poorly or inadequately tested, that’s on you.

Make your prop intuitive in its operation so others can figure it out when you are not around. The crew should be able to tell when the prop is set and when it has successfully operated. This way, if it fails, it will be easier to figure out why. Give visual and tactile clues to guide its operation. For example, if you need to turn a crank to operate it, make the crank unable to turn past its “on” and “off” position. If the prop uses electricity, put an LED indicator light so you know whether the prop is getting power or not. For a spring-loaded prop, there should be a satisfying “click” to know that it is loaded and ready to go.

Think about the ease of use and the amount of operator training it takes to use your prop successfully. If it is operated by a crew member who calls in sick right before a performance, will the replacement crew member be able to learn it in a short period of time? Again, make the operation as intuitive as possible. If you need to push a series of buttons and switches in a specific order, arrange them from left to right in that order.

Finally, make the prop easy to repair. If the prop has batteries, they need to be accessible to change them. Incandescent light bulbs also need to be reached. Do not lock these parts inside solid structures; sometimes, adding a small access panel or door is necessary. If you have other parts that may wear down or break, such as strings, rubber bands, or belts, build your prop so they are removable, rather than gluing them to some inaccessible surface.

Reset Time – If you want to have flower petals gently fall from the sky throughout the final scene of your play, you will have to clean them all up before the next show and load them back into the petal-dropping device. How long will this take to do? This will become the crew’s responsibility, and it will take them away from their other duties, or it could potentially lead to higher labor costs if the effect requires them to come in early every day.

If your theatre has more than one performance per day, such as a matinee and evening show, the effect needs to be able to be reset in between shows, which can be as short a time as an hour or two. Again, the running crew need to be able to do their other duties and often need a meal break in between shows as well.

Designing effects which are easy to reset can be even more challenging than designing the effect itself. For some effects, you may need multiple props that can get you through several performances; the crew can reset all of them at once during a less-busy time.

Cost – Every prop needs to fit within your budget. For your trick props, consider the cost of experimenting and prototyping as well as the cost of building the actual prop. Second, determine the cost per use. A prop which uses consumables, such as confetti, fog fluid, and batteries, will cost money every performance. Even a few cents’ worth of materials can add up over a multi-week run. Finally, consider the cost of repairs. For some props, you may wish to build a backup or two so the crew can swap them out when irreparable damage occurs. This is not always possible. If the cost of a potential repair exceeds your budget, you may wish to consider a different solution, or at least provide a back-up plan that the production and design team is okay with.

Triggering – A prop effect can be triggered by a crew member, the stage manager, an actor, or automatically. Each of these has its advantages and disadvantages, and what you choose depends on your specific set of circumstances.

Having a crew member trigger the effect will only work if a crew member is available. Check with stage management. The effect may be happening during a busy sequence where all the crew members are busy with something else, or they may need to be in other locations where they cannot get to the prop in time.

A stage manager may trigger an effect if it is possible to run a button to the booth. The disadvantage is that they are not on stage and may not have the best vantage point to make sure the prop is properly set or that it can be triggered without harming anyone nearby.

On the surface, having an actor trigger their own prop seems like the best solution because they can perfectly time it with their own action. However, the triggering action needs to be effortlessly smooth, intuitive, and reliable. Some actors have trouble operating a standard door knob while on stage. You want the actor to be focused on bringing their character to life and telling a story to the audience, not on jiggling a finicky switch to make a crossbow fire. A second problem with actor-triggered props is that if something goes wrong, it can break their focus, or worse, cause them to start improvising as they attempt to fix the problem.

Automatic triggering of a trick prop may occasionally be useful in theatre, but it is rare. We usually want a human in charge to get the timing just right. Automatic triggers also run the risk of going off at the wrong moment before everyone on and backstage is ready.

Back-up Plan – The cast, crew, and stage management need to know what to do if the effect does not work. If a decorative lighting or smoke effect fails to trigger, the show may continue uninterrupted. If a prop fails to make a sound effect, the sound operator should be ready to play a back-up sound cue through the regular speakers.

Other tricks can potentially prevent the performance from continuing. A magic door which fails to open will leave the actors stranded on stage: it should have a second way of opening without “magic” involved. A pair of trick handcuffs should not actually immobilize an actor’s arms: they should be built with an unlocking mechanism which the actor themselves can trigger.

The failure of a trick prop absolutely cannot put anyone in danger of harm. At worst, a prop failure should be a bit of an awkward moment where the audience realizes something went wrong and the actors improvise through. We have all heard the story (or one similar) where an actor’s fake gun fails to go off, so he proceeds to club the other actor to death with it. The show goes on.

Sightlines – A trick which is triggered by pulling ropes will not work if that prop is out in the middle of the stage with nowhere to hide the ropes. Electrical props need to be battery-powered if you do not have anywhere to hide power cords. In a proscenium space, you can hide a crew member behind a wall to trigger a prop; you cannot do this in-the-round. Always consider what the audience can or cannot see when designing your effect.

Besides the needs of the director/designer/playwright and the special considerations for trick props, your prop has all the needs of a regular prop as well. Remember to fulfill your prop’s aesthetics and physical characteristics. Aesthetics include the design style, period, color, transparency, sheen, and overall size. Physical characteristics include its strength, weight, impact resistance, water resistance, and inflammability.

Research and Brainstorm Solutions

At this point, you have a big list of problems your prop needs to solve, and you have probably already begun thinking of ways to achieve that. Now is the time to really dive in and come up with potential solutions.

Come up with as many possible solutions as you can. The more the merrier. Do not be afraid if they are way out in left field. Even rejected ideas may come in handy for prop problems in the future. Do not settle on your first idea. It may work, but you may have missed a simpler or more elegant solution.

Ideas come from research and brainstorming. Let’s look at research first.

Other props people are the most invaluable research source you can have. If you have a network of others in the field, you can keep track of who is good at electronics, or who recently put a sink on stage. They can point out potential pitfalls, suggest parts and materials, or refer you to another props person with more knowledge.

The employees at supply and hobby shops can also be helpful for research. If you need to make a remote control vacuum cleaner, talking to the people at a remote control car shop can help you narrow down the types of components. Some vendors may even get so excited at your project that they experiment with some of their parts to see if they can solve the problem for you.

The internet is full of websites and communities that can help. Chances are, if you need to make a trick prop, someone has already made something similar and put the instructions online. Instructables.com is a great central repository of projects, while YouTube.com has many “how-to” videos of props and tricks. The Cosplay community shares many tips on integrating LEDs and microcontrollers into projects, and the Halloween and Haunted House industries are a good source for information on pneumatics and animatronics. Other helpful communities center around model trains, and RC planes, cars, and boats.

Successful brainstorming involves asking questions. How do existing products solve your problem? As you take apart and analyze existing products, you build a mental library of mechanisms, techniques, and clever tricks. Can you combine parts to make a new solution?

Use analogies between your prop and random objects. You may notice solutions that would not have come to mind when you compare your problem to an entirely different situation. Ask yourself, “How is my prop like this random object?” or “How would I solve my problem using this random object?” The movement of an oscillating fan might be used for a sweeping surveillance camera. Props people can often be found holding up a hose from the plumbing aisle to a plastic waste bin from the cleaning aisle, ignoring the bewildered stares of the store’s employees.

When brainstorming, it can be helpful to ask others in your shop for ideas, or even to get a ...