How does it rain on a wooden stage inside the high school? How is it we can see lightning indoors, or fire that does not consume the theater? In the Lake Forest High School theaters, these are projected images that are now frighteningly real, a type of modern lighting design normally seen only in professional theaters.
These new special effects are created by intelligent, moving lights. Unlike stationery lighting that simply illuminates the stage, this new lighting equipment can move by remote-control, change color and be programmed to perform all kinds of unique gestures and lighting effects. They can also be programmed to track characters as they move across the stage. This gift to the Theater Department, which both teachers and students use to create new lighting designs, is a joint investment by the Lake Forest High School Foundation, PALS and the APT.
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“These lights are a great tool for lighting design for any stage production from concerts to plays, musicals and the Talent Show,” said Mary Toledano, the technical theater director at LFHS. “We used them for the Senior One Acts as spotlights and to create area effects on stage. For last spring’s musical, Newsies, we used them to highlight portions of scenery where the action was happening, and even moved the light into the audience. And we will use them again for the fall play, Failure: A Love Story.” (The fall play is Oct 13-15)
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"These are the lights you experience in most professional theaters, and will serve our students for well over a decade in both the RMA and the Little Theater.”
~ Mary Toledano
Technical Theater Director
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Senior One Acts Cast and Directors |
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LFHS Junior, Georgia Sottosanto-Sorenson, has helped Toledano with lighting design on various productions, and can see the great potential the new lights bring to the theater. “They open up options for new and exciting shows,” she said, “because we can project objects we may not be able to build.”
That’s where the idea for fire or rain comes from. It is these projections that make the stagecraft seem more real, and bring the scene to life. Moving and intelligent lights enhance almost any production, and allow the students doing lighting design for those productions to be more creative, Toledano said. “These are the lights you experience in most professional theaters”, she added, “and will serve our students for well over a decade in both the RMA and the Little Theater. The technology is easy to learn and will provide the passionate Tech Crew students further opportunities to be creative and develop their skill sets,” she said. “Additionally, these lights will expand the range of plays the department can produce.”
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Since 2011, the LFHS Foundation has awarded 5 grants
to enhance the theaters, investing over $136,000.
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Senior One Acts, August 2022 |
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The time has arrived to travel back to the 1920s for the fall play “Failure: A Love Story” by Philip Dawkins, and directed by LFHS teachers Joe Pulio and Sara Dreiling. “Failure” follows Mortimer Mortimer as he falls in love and loses each of the Fail sisters. Tuneful songs and a magical chorus create a whimsical world on stage that will captivate the audience. Performances are 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 13; Friday, Oct. 14, and Saturday, Oct. 15 in the Raymond Moore Auditorium. Tickets: $6-$15 at https://app.arts-people.com/index.php?show=143245
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State-of-the Art Tools Transform Learning n |
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During its 20-year history, the Foundation has helped transform numerous learning spaces to support collaboration & innovation. As technology keeps evolving, so do the Foundation’s contributions to state-of-the art tools. A few examples of new tools being provided this year include a turn-key video production set-up for live streaming school events, an iPad lending library, funded in partnership with the LDA for the Special Education Department, a piano microphone and keyboard amplifiers (co-funded with Applause) for the Music Department, which will be used by the many students in Band, Jazz Band, Orchestra and Choir. |
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for investing in educational excellence with us!
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Don't see your name on our list yet? Donate Today to support educational excellence across all departments at LFHS. Chances are one of the hundreds of grants the LFHS Foundation has funded are being used in one or more of your student's classes. We provide the resources that support teachers in taking learning to the next level. |
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2022-23 Donor List So Far . . . |
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