Stage design in its most basic form is how you fill the space of an empty stage. The way you fill out the space is highly dependent on a few things: budget, timing, effort, and creativity. On top of that, every few years stage design goes through phases. Because of this, a new style becomes the latest standard and it can happen very quickly.
Growing up in the church it seemed like plants on stage was the biggest deal. After that, corrugated plastic sheets took center stage. Later on, working more in corporate AV I started seeing modular plastic tiles. You can connect these plastic tiles together in almost any shape you want.
Later, aluminum mesh screening came into use heavily for churches and corporate events. These come in rolls of roughly 3 feet wide and were very cheap to purchase. You can hang sheets of mesh can easily on the back of a stage. Most importantly, mesh really shines with some uplighting under them.
Now, LED lighting tape is taking over stages everywhere. Since LED is becoming more common, it has become cheaper and more accessible. The way most people use LED tape is simple RGB LED strips. Strips come in rolls of 5 or 10 meters. You can even cut down or extended them to any size needed.
You can attach strips directly to truss or stage pieces. Alternatively, you can attach them to PVC pipes, wooden strips, or dowels. For instance, you can set them up on a wooden stick and make any shape with them that you can imagine. When you want to mix it up you can simply reconfigure the strips into a new shape.
Who knows what the next trend in stage design will be. I will go more in-depth about Stage design at another time. Come back soon for more articles where we will break down all things AV into more digestible bites and explain it for you. What was the most interesting stage design you have seen? Leave your reply in the comments below. Don’t forget to tell us what you want to know more about and we will add it to the list of future topics!