Lighting Automation

“The goal of this project is to establish a theatrical lighting pre-visualization suite for the Design and Production program in the School of Theatre.”-- Assistant Professor of Lighting Design and Design and Production Co-Chair Jorge Arroyo

Lighting is an ephemeral medium, making it difficult to teach and discuss in the classroom. Educators need tools and methods that let them reify course concepts and provide ways for students to communicate their ideas back to them. 

In the Light Lab, located within Boston University’s Joan & Edgar Booth Theatre and the College of Fine Arts (CFA) Production Center, light can become a tangible thing where visual ideas can be explored in a small, controlled environment. However, student-owned personal computing equipment is insufficient to work with a lighting visualizer at the scale and level of detail students would like, and the expense of purchasing the equipment creates an equity barrier for students.

“By removing this financial barrier, we can create limitless possibilities for all student's work, regardless of their financial situation and beyond what is available to them within the Booth Theatre,” said Assistant Professor of Lighting Design and Design and Production Co-Chair Jorge Arroyo.

To address this problem, Arroyo received Shipley Accelerating Classroom Transformation (ACT) funding to purchase a visualizer suite with the hardware necessary to run a graphics-intensive computer program that would allow students granular control over light at a much larger and dynamic scale than current Light Lab technologies could provide. The university purchase of the equipment makes the technology available to all lighting students, creating more equitable access for a diversity of students at BU. Additionally, students will now be familiar with the newest software being used in the field, giving students a leg up when they go to apply for careers in lighting. 

According to BU student, Conor Thiele, “With this resource available I was more willing to take risks and experiment with my designs as it did not take as long to create them. I was able to dedicate time to this course alone because of the sign up times to use the rendering computer.”

CFA TH 589 Automated Lighting Design incorporates this new equipment and is offered every fall semester. Students are also able to use the visualizer equipment for independent learning projects as well as for their production work in preparation for School of Theatre shows. The integration of this cutting-edge technology allows students enrolled in Arroyo’s lighting courses to more fully meet course learning outcomes, to include:

• Establishing competency in working with complex lighting systems.
• Increasing the impact of theoretical “paper projects” by allowing students to demonstrate sample light cues.
• Establishing competency in programming multiple lighting consoles.
• Conveying understanding of how to create and manipulate 3D environments.

“This project has had a big impact on my teaching. Now, I don’t have to worry about how big a student project is getting,” Arroyo said. “I used to have to stop students at a certain scale because the computer would struggle. I used to have to stop students’ imaginations.”

The new visualizer system allows students to produce projects that are more akin to their talent levels and skills, addressing the issue of students outgrowing the previously available technology too quickly. According to Arroyo, “The difference between student projects before and after the introduction of this technology is like the difference between a flip book and a 4k movie.”

According to BU student, Noah Wrafter, “The rendering station allowed us to explore larger, more complicated systems without any restrictions on quality or scale of the end project under Jorge’s guidance.”

To leverage the possibilities for symbiotic relationships between similar technologies, Arroyo and colleagues in CFA are hoping to establish a technology suite that will include the visualizer system, light detection and ranging (LIDAR) equipment purchased through a separate ACT grant, and additional technologies, to enhance collaboration between projects across the college.

In the News

Shipley Center Grant expands access to New Lighting Design Technology in School of Theatre. (2024). Retrieved from https://www.bu.edu/cfa/news/articles/2024/lighting-design-automation-shipley-grant/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=link_post&utm_content=research&utm_campaign=cfa_social 

Project Lead

Jorge Arroyo

Assistant Professor of Lighting Design, Design and Production Co-Chair arroyo@bu.edu

Jorge is an Assistant Professor of Lighting Design and the Co-Chair of the Design, Production, and Management Program in the College of Fine Arts. He has almost 30 years of experience in theater, dance, concerts, corporate events, opera, and television. His work has been seen…Read More

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Jorge Arroyo

Assistant Professor of Lighting Design, Design and Production Co-Chair arroyo@bu.edu

Jorge is an Assistant Professor of Lighting Design and the Co-Chair of the Design, Production, and Management Program in the College of Fine Arts. He has almost 30 years of experience in theater, dance, concerts, corporate events, opera, and television. His work has been seen at venues such as The Alley Theatre, The Huntington, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Boston Lyric Opera, The Apollo Theater, Carnegie Hall, Baltimore Center Stage, The Arden, and others. He has created designs for over 50 shows at both the New Jersey Performing Arts Center and Jazz at Lincoln Center for artists such as Alicia Keys, Gabriel Iglesias, the Wayans Brothers, the Chieftains, BeBe and CeCe Winans, Paquito D'Rivera, Phoebe Snow, Stanley Jordan, Kenny Garrett, Jackie Mason, and others. He has also worked with choreographer Stacey Tookey, three-time Emmy nominee for her choreography on FOX’s So You Think You Can Dance, on her production of Moments Defined in both New York and California. Jorge received his MFA from New York University.