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Using Stage and Roof Systems for Your Event: A Guide for Event Planners

At In Depth Events, we’ve built hundreds of rooftops for outdoor events. Whether your event is using a load bearing stage and roof system or a non load bearing stage and roof system (also called a genie roof, or a shade roof), the basic rules that apply to safety and successful use are the same. Below, we’ll go over the most important guidelines for a successful show!

Pre-planning with your production vendor

Vital to the process of setting up a successful event is pre-planning. In most cases, the stage and roof systems are central to the event, so it’s important to get an overhead site plan in place early in the game. Begin by placing the stage and roof in a central location, pointing away from any close residential areas. Then, you can sketch in vendor booths, points of entry and exit for audience and placement of vendor booths and port-o-potties. Once you have a working diagram, check for crowd flow.

It’s better to have your stage and roof systems on high ground for a variety of reasons. It’s better acoustically, because it allows the PA to throw farther. It’s helpful for visibility as well. Most importantly, if it rains, then the performance area doesn’t get flooded out.

All stage and roof systems need to be guyed down. In some cases, we’ll use ground stakes to guy a rooftop down. However, if the rooftop is to be placed on concrete, or in a grassy area where power, gas, or sewer lines are underground, we’ll use water ballast. It’s important to know which type of points we’ll be using long before our trucks arrive.

On site with your production crew

All production companies want you to have a successful event. However, we need your help to make this happen! First and foremost, make sure you or a senior member of your staff is on site at the pre-arranged load in time to show the crew exactly where the rooftop is going to be placed. Have a printed version of your overhead and a printed version of the schedule of events ready for the production crew chief. This simple step will solve the majority of timing and placement issues.

The production crew chief will need to be able to access a senior member of your event staff at all times during the event. If you are using radios, make sure he has one assigned to him and knows where to charge it up during off times. If you are using cell phones, make sure to swap numbers and check them. Communication is key!

Finally, please provide the basic necessities for your crew. Many times, a crew will show up to begin the build two days before the event starts. If the porta-potties are not scheduled until the day before the event, things can get messy. Also, please make arrangements for water and ice to be available to your stagehands as they build your rooftop, during the run of show and for strike. (The occasional pizza delivery doesn’t hurt, either!)

Promotional banners and soft goods

It’s common for banners to be used for both load bearing and non load bearing rooftops. Each rooftop has different sizes available for banner hangs, so make sure and check with your event professional to see what these sizes can be – and let them know you are planning on hanging banners on our structures. We’re happy to hang these banners for you, but please be aware of these guidelines:

All banners MUST BE made of blow through material. Flat vinyl banners will not be hung. Smilies are not acceptable.
All banners must be grommeted on all four sides. Grommets must be placed on 18″ centers.
Our crew chief or rooftop supervisor has the final authority on any banners hung on our structures.

All banner art should be above center. The most common banner placements are teaser banners (above the stage, on the downstage truss), backdrops and flybay banners.

Safety, Safety, Safety

At In Depth Events, we are rabid about the safety of your talent and your attendees. We make every effort to make sure our structures are safe, and we will always have a rooftop operator on site to make sure that all components are functioning properly. In fact, in many cases, we’ll use portable weather stations mounted to the rooftop itself to monitor weather events in real time.

Your on-site operator will always be watching for one of four occurrences that will cause us to bring the rooftop down.

#1: Heavy rain. Drizzle and small storms don’t affect us. A raging downpour does. If you see frogs coming from the sky and small rivers forming, we will bring the rooftop down.
#2: High winds. Our roof systems are rated for moderate winds, but high winds will cause us to bring the roof down. If you see Dorothy and Toto, it’s time for the roof to be lowered.
#3: Lighting in the area. Lighting strikes within a few miles of our rooftops are bad news. A metal structure higher than anything else around it is a natural conductor. Unless you want your hamburger well done, we’re dropping the roof.
#4: Someone runs a car into one of our uprights. Yes, this really has happened before. If someone driving on your show site manages to hit the large aluminum structure in the middle of the event area, he’s probably hit it hard enough to impair the structural integrity. The roof needs to come down and be checked.

In most cases, we can re-raise the roof and continue with the show once the danger has passed. However, the rooftop operator has sole authority on lowering the roof and on re-raising it. If your rooftop operator tells you it’s time to bring the rooftop down, there is a good reason for doing so.

Hopefully this blog has been informative for our event planner clients! For more information on In Depth Events and our event production capabilities, please Ask Us a Question today. We look forward to hearing from you and working with you on your event!

Selecting the Best Production Vendor for Your Outdoor Festivals

If you’re throwing outdoor festivals, then choosing the right production vendor is the single biggest decision you’ll make towards the success of your event. Take a look below to see a few tips on finding the right production vendor for staging rental, audio rental, and lighting rental for your outdoor festival!

Step One: Start early and plan ahead when choosing a production company

Whether it’s a college block party, a ‘City Of’, or a State Fair, having the right company for your stage and roof system, audio rental, lighting rental and generator rental can make or break outdoor festivals. Most importantly, you need someone that you can build a relationship with – someone that you trust will do what they say they are going to do.

Building a relationship takes time. Begin looking for your vendors well in advance of your show. Have your details in place when you are interviewing vendors – overhead layouts of your venue, band riders and event dates and times are key to helping your production company provide an accurate quote for your event. In addition, most production companies like to see at least a three month advance contact before the date of your show and never less than one month. Frantically calling production vendors a week before the event date is not a way to build trust!

Interview the production company, get multiple bids and check references

Outdoor festivals are arguably the most difficult type of event there is for a production company. Tight set changes, multiple bands and crowd control issues are compounded by weather, temporary power and permitting requirements. Your production company for your outdoor festival should be part of the solution, not an additional headache that you have to deal with.

Therefore, you need to make sure they companies your are interviewing know what they are talking about! Conduct interviews with sales staff and project leads – a reputable company will be thrilled with the opportunity to meet with you and see the venue. Be prepared to get multiple bids and check them for the gear you need. Your production company should be open to discussion on the bid and the equipment listed in your quote.

Finally, check references! The production company should own the majority of the equipment they are bringing to your show. Avoid ‘show brokers’ – they typically cause more trouble than they are worth and their references will reflect this. Ask about their safety records. Don’t hesitate to ask all companies bidding on your event about the reputations of their competitors. Production is a very small industry, and we’ve all worked together at one time or the other. A company that is reviled across the industry is bad news.

Choosing a Production Company to Provide Outdoor Support for LED Video Screens

So, you’re sitting at home, relaxing, and suddenly the light you are sitting under begins to flicker on and off and the wonderful smell of burning insulation assaults your nostrils. What do you do? Find your handy wire cutters and start snipping away? Get a glass of water and put the fire out? Ignore it and walk outside to watch the house burn down? No! You call the experts and tell them to get there as quickly as possible, right?

Now, ask yourself what happens when a client asks you to hang twenty tons of LED wall in an outdoor environment. Do you go to your garage and pull out the old movie screen Dad used to show the slides of family vacations? Or do you call the experts?

At In Depth Events, we’re the experts for all types of production needs. One of the many things we have experience in is load bearing structures for concerts and festivals. We’ve taken that experience and equipment and made ourselves one of the premier experts in the United States for load bearing LED screen supports.

Very few companies in the United States have the experience or equipment to hang an large format LED wall properly. Even fewer have the ability to hang them in an outdoor, free standing environment. However, that’s just what we do. Our experts can hang your screen in a variety of applications on a variety of surfaces. Our trucking and logistics team can get our structures anywhere in the country. And, our network of structural engineers can satisfy the most demanding permit requirements.

As a marketing professional, promoter, or PR firm, you owe it to your clients to choose the right expert for the job. Choose a company with the experience, equipment and talent to provide the best structure for your LED video screen – In Depth Events.

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How to Choose the Right Sound System Rental for your Live Event

A full concert audio line array system for an outdoor festival

Contrary to popular belief, not everyone is an audio engineer. However, you wouldn’t think so if you’ve ever attended a live event with bad audio. As the audience is leaving (usually before the event has ended) the common sentence heard from the audience is typically a version of “Wow, that sounded really bad!” Sometimes, the word used is a little more vulgar and rhymes with ‘fit’ – you know which one I mean!

Choosing the right sound system rental is a vital part of the process of doing live events. The audio at your event needs to be clear with full range of lows to highs accurately broadcast. Notice that I didn’t say ‘loud’, because loud isn’t necessarily good sound! As a live event producer, marketing firm or even the ‘man on the street’ – live audio needs to sound good to get the message across. Hopefully, this article will allow you to walk away with a little more information on selecting the proper sound system rental for your specific type of event.

In this article, we’ll begin with the basics and talk about loudspeakers. Loudspeakers can be grouped into two major categories for live events: Conventional Loudspeakers and Line Array.

Conventional Speakers

Conventional speakers (also known as point source boxes for the technically astute) are based on the same designs and components that became popular with the advent of the telephone and gramophone. You’ve seen these types of speakers ever since you were a kid and they are typically used for everything from high school choir performances to smaller concerts. Some people consider them a cheaper alternative to Line Array, but they are not the poor cousin. Conventional speakers have several advantages over Line Array, including the ability to cover a more diverse type of venue, better volume control in smaller areas and a much more natural sound at lower volume levels.

Line Array

Line Array, while still using similar components as conventional speakers, are a different breed of loudspeakers. Introduced in the mid-90’s, Line Array uses constructive interference to throw sound farther than is possible with conventional loudspeakers. Typically, a Line Array is flown; hung from the ceiling of a venue or from a load bearing structure, as pictured. Line Array is also normally louder than conventional speakers. As a result, it’s used for large concerts in both indoor and outdoor venues. However, it’s not a solution for every show – it’s limitations in directivity and the very nature of its long throw characteristics make it a poor choice for intimate venues, certain types of outdoor events and events where flying PA is impractical.

Technological advances in loudspeaker and amplification technology has made both types of loudspeakers viable options for your sound system rental depending on the type of venue and event you are planning.

Category: Rooftops