Could it be? But I thought Rocky says that's not rigging. I was all ready to use that for a title for a stage rigging book: "Rocky Says That's Not Rigging." Hmm.
I have for a few years now been involved with a group of industry professionals trying to formulate a certification for entertainment riggers. The group is dominated by truss & motor riggers, people who have been grouped for parlance under the heading "Arena Riggers" even though they work predominantly in convention halls. The rest of us have been lumped under "Theatrical Riggers" although the arena guys keep trying to split us into "installers" and "show crew."
One of my missions in this group has been to try to make sure that when the dust settles we don't wind up with a cert that covers the arena guys and nothing to cover the theatre guys. It's been a tough road. The people opposing the idea say that "flymen" don't need a cert, and that the install of these items is "carpenter's work", and that there isn't really anyone working like that (at least not a population significant enough to drive a certification program), and that we really don't work with that much weight - so how dangerous can it be?
I've been trying to explain that theatre guys are also responsible for the volume of work done by arena riggers. That in some ways, even arena type point ever set is just a "dead pick" in my world, and that the arena guys would only have to pick up a very little bit of information to learn the theatre end.
Suffice it to say that most of the arena guys disagree.
Today I opened an attachment I got last week from the consulting agency working with us to come up with the actual certification. This is actually the third survey I have participated in. The first two were about "do you think a certification would be a good idea?" This one was about individual job tasks and whether they were part of what you do as a rigger. It also had a slew of demographic questions: what you do, where you work, how long you've been working. What did it say? Basically it says to many people a rigger is a rigger is a rigger.
(there's a NDA in play here, so I don't want to be too specific)
Could it be? Was I right all along? I wonder if that be enough to switch the program to a single certification rather than two. Somehow I think it is still to low an agreement, but its certainly enough to argue - and I do love to argue. Suddenly this meeting I wasn't looking forward to next week is looking more interesting.
4 comments:
And the riggers in a themed environment (i.e. contruction site) are arena riggers because the work from dead picks? The union carpenters wouldn't touch what they put up. And we used stage riggers to do it. Should there be more training for a niche like this?
I guess my point has always been that if you were going to certify someone for rigging, that they should be compitent for all flavors, not just a niche.
What's a "dead pick"? Is that a common term among riggers?
a "pick" is a line that supports something vertically, short for "pick-up." There are "running" picks and "dead" or "static" picks. Running picks are pickups for something that can be raised or lowered. Dead picks are "dead tied" to support and remain at one length, holding the item in one position. The terms are typical for riggers.
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