Lighting Design

History of Lighting Design

Sunlight 

The first uses of lighting for theatre can be drawn back to the Greeks
and the Romans who strategically built their stages in order to harness
the full potential of the sun.  These stages were built on hills and faced
so that the sun would come from behind the audience. This allowed the
sun to hit the stage yet keep it out of the audiences eyes. They could
perform their shows at different times of day to get a different kind of
natural lighting. 
Problems with Sunlight:

• Not all the light was kept out of the audiences eyes
• With the development of indoor theatres, people could no longer rely
on sunlight to be the primary source of lighting.
Candles
Candles started to be used in the court theatres of Italy in the late
1500’s.  Sebastiano Serlio, an Italian architect was one of the first to talk
about utilising candles in theatres.  This is where colour was first
utilised with the use of amber, red and blue water in flask placed in front
of candles. Thousands of candles were required to light a stage and were
in chandeliers or footlights, where hundreds of candles would be on the
edge of the stage to light faces.
Nicola Sabatini designed a numerous amounts of lighting innovations
that allowed lighting to be dimmed for the first time.  He did this by
lowering metal cylinders on top of the candles to dim the light without
putting the flames out. Sanatini also invented the spotlight by placing a
polished sink behind a light source allowing light to be directed to a
certain part of the stage. 
Problems with Candles:

• Candles caused a lot of heat and oxygen depletion causing people to

faint in the theatre
• The wick of candles required trimming and relighting which is why
intermissions were needed throughout the performance
• Hot wax and grease would drip on the audience and actors 
Oil Lamp 

Oil lamps were designed by Aime Argand and they provided greater
illumination than the candles.  Because there were in closed, the flame
was able to be steadied and therefore brighter. 
Problems with oil lamps:

• Oil lamps along with candles were expensive to maintain and replace
at the rate that they needed to be 
Gas 
• lighting was revolutionary when it was first being used in the theatres
and was a fourth of the cost of candles or oil lamps.  It was first
introduced in 1815 at the Olympic Theatre. Gas was produced by
heating coal at extreme temperatures for hours and then cooled and
condensed into storage tanks.  
• Gas systems allowed the lights to be controlled from a distance by
how much gas was supplied to each set of lights. Light could also start
to come from different angles as gas lighting instruments were
developed.  Audience lights could be dimmed for the first time
creating more realism. 
• Gas lighting caused set design to change as designers had to take into
consideration how painted elements would look with bright white or
coloured light on them. Sets started to become more interactive
because the actors could move behind the proscenium arch and could
still be seen.  
• The intense white quality of light also called for makeup to change. 
Hence the invention of gas lighting kickstarted the modern idea of
design that we think of today.
Problems with gas:
• Hundreds of theatres burnt down due to leaks in the gas system 
• Lighting was perfect from the sides and footlight but not from above
• Oxygen was still being depleted from the theatre
Electric and Modern
In 1878, Joseph Swan patent the world’s first incandescent electric
lamp.  Gas was quickly out of the theatres and within one year the Paris
Opera introduced this new type of lighting.  Although this lighting was
revolutionary, no new methods of lighting were developed, the old
footlights, strip lights and border lights were simply replaced by
electrical lights. 
Overtime, brighter and larger lights were developed.  Designers
started experimenting with colour and focus creating complex lighting
plots.  With the invention of a lighting console lighting information
could be stored and become more complex then having them on or off. 
 LED lights which started to become popular in 2007 allowed for the
colour of light to be changes from a console without any lighting gel or
material needed.  These lights instantly change colour and although
more expensive, allow theatres to cut down on the amounts of lights
needed. Instead of having 10 lights with red gel and 10 with blue gel, a
theatre could just use 10 LED lights.  More recently moveable LED
lights are coming to the stages. These lights can be programmed to
move to a certain spot on stage and cut down the need for hundreds of
lights even more.  

Reference:
https://pragueyouththeatre.wordpress.com/2019/09/17/a-history-of-lighting-design-from-sunlight-to-stage-light/
Electrical Lighting Calculation
https://www.slideshare.net/MusaibUlhassanbhat/electrical-
lighting-design-and-calculations
https://www.slideshare.net/MusaibUlhassanbhat/electrical-
lighting-design-and-calculations