What does a general technician do ?

[Deathride]

Right first things first I have no knowledge of what one does and would just like to know basically

 

also something which would be nice is to know what kind of tasks one does in a day

 

thanks in advance

[paulears]

Well a lx technician does lights, a sound technician does sound, a stage technician does stage work etc You can have any specialsim you want. A general Technician does simply a bit of them all - some do all well, some don't.

 

Many venues used to just have technicians - they often prefered one area, but nowadays each area seems to have devolved into a separate job where people don't do crossovers. That, in my humble opinion is a shame and encourages "not my problem" attitudes.

paul

[Paul_LX]

I am employed as a general technician in a cival theatre. But as paul has said we split of into our specialist subjects without prompt which is very helpful, but still have the knowledge to cover any section if needs must. I agree that venue technicians will adoubt the "its not my department"

[Deathride]

cheers for that guys wern't exactly sure and finding things like this on google well need I say more ?

 

I might be young and the not my problem attitude I think is the cause of the lazy generation " emo's" I personaly think are the worse because you ask them to do a job and they turn around and say something like "am I bothered " which after the 100th time gets a little boaring

[Thirdtap]

Depending on where you are there are alot of non theatrical 'technical' jobs that you may be asked or expected to do - plumbing, building maintenance, moving photocopy paper, advertising boards - changing the posters. From a job application I got many years ago for a post in a theatre in Liverpool on the main list of jobs under the regular theatre ones was it would be the post holders responsibility to look after the storage of the ice cream!!

'Sorry not touching that it's frozen yogurt, don't do yogurt

[gnomatron]

cheers for that guys wern't exactly sure and finding things like this on google well need I say more ?

 

I might be young and the not my problem attitude I think is the cause of the lazy generation " emo's" I personaly think are the worse because you ask them to do a job and they turn around and say something like "am I bothered " which after the 100th time gets a little boaring

 

Nah, I disagree, the "not my problem" attitude is endemic in all generations; if anything it's found more in older people, who tend to be more set in their ways and have a more fixed idea of their sphere of influence.

[Jamtastic3]

I'd have to discuss the whole 'not my problem' attitude because it has good and bad points.

Yes, it could be said that there is a certain blame on one particular area when it comes down to something going wrong, but is that the attitude that you want in an industry where everyone co-operates with everyone else.

In my personal experience however, that scenario does arouse. As I am a lighting engineer I wouldn't know what to do if something with the sound system played up - ok yeah sure, the sound is distorting - bring down the faders, trim off the gain. But if it was something more serious and the sound engineers weren't present then I'd have to say that it was there own neglect causing the fault, hence me and my 'not my problem' attitude.

But at the same time, does that make me ignorant to the fact that I don't know much about sound and that I've only specified myself to the one area?

I would say that yeah it's good to have an all round technician but personally I'd employ a team of lighting engineers AND sound engineers if budget and venue/equipment specs were possibly needed.