We have neglected our scenic friends in our enthusiasm for lighting products. Sad, because there are a TON of really cool scenic products out there that will make your life easier. These are a few of my favorites.
Foamcoat
How many of you have had to make scenery or props out of Styrofoam? That stuff is so useful and yet always a hot mess. The little white pebbly bits get into everything and trying to paint it is an exercise in futility. I once carved castle wall panels for a local theatre. Those suckers were 14' tall, 8' wide and about 2' thick. I carved stones for weeks and weeks and it was loads of fun. The downside is that I sucked Styrofoam pebbles out of my car until the day I sold it and I'm pretty sure that for months my washing machine was growling at me when I approached with my paint clothes. Appliances can be crabby like that.
The biggest problem of Styrofoam though is that it doesn't like to accept paint. There are all sorts of ways around this from draping it in muslin that has been soaked in watered down glue to doing some sort of funky paper mache thing. There is an easier way. Foamcoat! Foamcoat is this nifty product that looks like grey sludge in the bucket. It is the consistency of runny clay and looks slightly gross. The cool thing is that it is a runny sort of clay with tiny fibers in it. When it is painted on a Styrofoam surface, those fibers lock together and make a hard coating that paint just loves. You can even mix your base color into the Foamcoat if you like. If you put a thick enough layer of that stuff on there you can even go back and carve fine details into the foamcoat once it dries. I used it as a base coat on my castle and turned my pebbly Styrofoam walls into rock almost instantly. A couple of paint treatments later and you would have sworn we had built the set out of huge chunks of stone. You can get it in gallon size up to 3.5 gallon buckets and can brush or roll it on (although brushing it on gives you more control). It is a life saver!
Flexcoat is a similar product used for the same reasons. It has a little give to it though. If you load a foamcoated rock on a truck and then ram it with a road case, that surface is going to crack. Flexcoat will give a little, so your rock is saved. It also takes paint well.
Tough Prime
Tough Prime is just what it sounds like- a really tough primer paint. It comes in black and white, and the white can be tinted. The joy of Tough Prime is that it sticks to everything. Really. PVC, metal, wood... you name it and it will stick. It is the best paint for your stage floor since it will resist scrapes and scuffs (because seeing the hot pink you used for Seussical leaking up through your black floor is festive, but not fun). I love the Tough Prime line!
Crystal Gel
Crystal Gel is a thick goopy clear product that is about the consistency of hair gel. You can pipe it on with a pastry bag or trowel it on with assorted tools. It also will stick to almost anything and it takes paint. This is a great way to add details to props and scenery. You can also tint it and use it on Plexiglas to make really interesting stained glass effects.
Flamex
Fire is bad. Especially in a theatre, fire is bad. There are all sorts of rules about scenery and fire in schools and on stage. Flamex will very quickly become your best friend. This stuff can be brushed, rolled, sprayed or dipped. There are formulas for bare wood, synthetic fabrics, natural fabrics, blends and paper products. There is even a paint additive that can be stirred into a gallon of paint. Flamex makes surfaces flame retardant. They might still smolder, but won't burst into flame. There are MSDS forms and flame resistance paperwork on these so you can make your local fire marshall happy.
Clear Flat/ Gloss Acrylic
Rosco makes this nifty product that is similar to polyurethane, but not quite as stinky and toxic. It can be added to paint to extend it and to change its final sheen. Scenically it is a lot easier to paint with flat or matte paints. This product allows you to change it to gloss or semi-gloss after the fact. One of the most spectacular times I remember seeing it utilized was on a Romeo & Juliet set years ago. We had plastered the whole thing with joint compound (before the days of Foamcoat) so it looked like old stucco. The scenic designer then had us wash it with about 8 different colored glazes made of thinned scenic paint. The final coat was with the clear semi-gloss acrylic. While we were working on it the whole deal just looked kind of muddy and blah. I was a young scenic artist at the time and was not impressed by what we were doing. Quite frankly, it looked kind of ugly. We brushed that final glaze on though and the whole thing just glowed. It looked like a Renaissance painting. I have been a fan of the gloss acrylics ever since. It can be brushed, rolled or sprayed.
Breakaways
'Fess up. You have ALWAYS wanted to wonk someone over the head with a bottle, right? I mean, how fun is that? Breakaway bottles are made to shatter realistically without killing the actor. They come as wine bottles, beer bottles and whiskey bottles. You have to buy them six at a time, but let's face it, you are going to want to smash more than that.
Loose Pin Hinges
Do you know about loose pin hinges? They look just like a regular hinge, but the pin that holds the thing together comes out. You can assemble flats together like you would with a regular hinge, and then pull the pin to take them apart for scene changes or storage.
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