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[Jason Lucas]

Jason, I'll grab a few pics of our setup on Tuesday after we get our system setup. We generally keep it pretty neat and can setup in a little over an hour.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

Nice, it takes about 3 or 4 hours for me to put the stage back together after a retreat. I'm trying to find ways to speed up the process.

[Jonathan Goodall]

I wanted to ask if some of you could post some pictures of examples of good cable management on a stage in a non-permanent setup?

I'm a visual person and seeing some good examples would be nice.

Thanks!

Just realised that I have never really taken pictures of cabling as such, this is the best I have, hope its a good example.  (ignore the birds nest at the base of the stand, the artist had only just turned up with the pedal so it wasn't "all pretty" yet lol) 

[Rob Gow]

I use an 8 channel drop snake at the drums when I'm mixing from the stage, and an 8 channel out front.

6 channels are for the drums, then bass and stage left guitar which are both on the same side.

An 8 channel drop snake goes to the front, handling 4 mics and any DI boxes that are needed.

Monitors tied in from furthest away to closest, then I can take them up in reverse order. When the band walks in to a nice cleanly dressed stage, the first impression is that you have your stuff together.

Some people leave the mic cord extra at the mic. I prefer to leave a couple feet at the mic and the rest  at the drop box.

[Tim McCulloch]

I wanted to ask if some of you could post some pictures of examples of good cable management on a stage in a non-permanent setup?

I'm a visual person and seeing some good examples would be nice.

Thanks!

Here's a tip, Mr. Visual Person - get tested for dyslexia and other text impairments.  Seriously.  I work with someone who didn't realize for decades that he had a treatable condition.

That said, if it looks ugly it is ugly.  If it looks like a trip hazard, is surely is... and some things that do not appear to be a hazard, are.

Gaffers tape is cheaper than a lawsuit.  If you get sued anyway, at least you can say you took "reasonable precautions."  The jury award might be a little smaller...

What are the goals of cable management?  Low profile, so artists won't trip & fall?  Securing to the floor so it wont roll under foot?  Protecting it against crushing from casters or foot traffic?  Aesthetics?  All of these might require a different approach or combinations of several approaches.

[Jay Barracato]

Here's a tip, Mr. Visual Person - get tested for dyslexia and other text impairments.  Seriously.  I work with someone who didn't realize for decades that he had a treatable condition.

That said, if it looks ugly it is ugly.  If it looks like a trip hazard, is surely is... and some things that do not appear to be a hazard, are.

Gaffers tape is cheaper than a lawsuit.  If you get sued anyway, at least you can say you took "reasonable precautions."  The jury award might be a little smaller...

What are the goals of cable management?  Low profile, so artists won't trip & fall?  Securing to the floor so it wont roll under foot?  Protecting it against crushing from casters or foot traffic?  Aesthetics?  All of these might require a different approach or combinations of several approaches.

A stage is properly dressed when you don't notice the cabling.

Once upon a time, I was at a longish festival with multiple stages working with several different artists as a band tech. The providers plan for the "Master Stage" did not include any relief for the tech assigned there, so any time I showed up and said this is one of the bands I handle, the tech assigned to that stage used it as break time (i.e. run to the restroom or get feed). After a couple of days of 5 minutes to get a band offstage, followed by 5 minutes to get the next band onstage, things had become really snarled. I had the last show of the night and was using my own mic kit, so his had been put away.

I was up earlier than most the next morning and after seeing the stage in the light just had to do something, so I spent 30 minutes repatching and dressing the stage. He mentioned later that someone had cleaned up and I just said, "if you are nice to visiting techs, the stage fairy may just come by in the night and redress your stage."

[Tim McCulloch]

A stage is properly dressed when you don't notice the cabling.

Once upon a time, I was at a longish festival with multiple stages working with several different artists as a band tech. The providers plan for the "Master Stage" did not include any relief for the tech assigned there, so any time I showed up and said this is one of the bands I handle, the tech assigned to that stage used it as break time (i.e. run to the restroom or get feed). After a couple of days of 5 minutes to get a band offstage, followed by 5 minutes to get the next band onstage, things had become really snarled. I had the last show of the night and was using my own mic kit, so his had been put away.

I was up earlier than most the next morning and after seeing the stage in the light just had to do something, so I spent 30 minutes repatching and dressing the stage. He mentioned later that someone had cleaned up and I just said, "if you are nice to visiting techs, the stage fairy may just come by in the night and redress your stage."

We took on an "acoustic" music festival (over 20 years ago, we still do it) and the first day nearly kicked our butts.  Similar to your description, only 1 tech for stage/mons and me at FOH.  We untangled the mess after the last band and retreated to the camper to figure out a better plan.

We came up with the idea of a "pod" that consisted of a vox mic, an instrument mic and a DI.  Five pods across the front and 2 upstage.  "Walk up to where you stand or sit, and we'll get you set."  We put a 12 channel sub snake downstage and got the first 4 pods, and home-ran the 5th directly to the splitter.  Upstage we had an 8 channel sub snake.  The way we ran them (a few ran under the stage, they were very long) it was not necessary for the Emcee or talent to cross or step over *any* cables.  We still had to untangle cables at the end of the 16 hour day, but it was much smaller serving of PVC Pasta.

The other thing we did was put up a sign backstage, next to where the bands signed in with the stage manager, telling them to send someone to monitor world to confirm the stage plot and input list.  Things got much better.

So for Jason - subsnakes are your friend.  Shorter cables that get twisted up will get separated sooner than longer cables (trust me).  Looms, when appropriate, can save time or dress up appearances.  Good quality gaffers tape for what needs it, and the 3" black duct tape the AV guys use for the rest. 

[Jason Lucas]

Here's a tip, Mr. Visual Person - get tested for dyslexia and other text impairments.  Seriously.  I work with someone who didn't realize for decades that he had a treatable condition.

That said, if it looks ugly it is ugly.  If it looks like a trip hazard, is surely is... and some things that do not appear to be a hazard, are.

Gaffers tape is cheaper than a lawsuit.  If you get sued anyway, at least you can say you took "reasonable precautions."  The jury award might be a little smaller...

What are the goals of cable management?  Low profile, so artists won't trip & fall?  Securing to the floor so it wont roll under foot?  Protecting it against crushing from casters or foot traffic?  Aesthetics?  All of these might require a different approach or combinations of several approaches.

I can say with relative certainty that I do not have any form of dyslexia.

There's two things here, one is serviceability. I want to be able to patch and re-patch things more quickly than I'm able to now. The other is aesthetics. The stage is a bit messy right now.

[Steve M Smith]

You might like this one from the PA of the Day Facebook page...




Steve.

[Rob Gow]

I can say with relative certainty that I do not have any form of dyslexia.

There's two things here, one is serviceability. I want to be able to patch and re-patch things more quickly than I'm able to now. The other is aesthetics. The stage is a bit messy right now.

What are you patching and re-patching? I often don't know what a band will need, with my situation. The 8 channel drop snake typical has 3 or 4 vocal mics running to it. I patch the rest in order, to where I would patch 4 DI's. then once the band is there, if they need a DI or two, its all ready to go since its patched in at the main snake.

Label both ends of each XLR if you need to. I generally don't need to, but I do when it's called for. I might have mentioned there will be a small pile of cable spaghetti at certain points, but the pile is out of the way, not a tripping hazard. Also, since I always tear down in a specific order, I'm always taking the next cord on the top so I don't end up with a big mess of cords when tearing down.

You can see the organized mess is circled. Again, out of the way and unobtrusive.

[Mark McFarlane]

As others have said, sub snakes are your friend.

Using the shortest cable possible is also helpful. All my XLR velcro wraps are color coded by length.  I lay the cables out on the stage in piles of equal length. First position monitors, mics, DIs, subsnake, then grab the shortest cable that will work.  Leave a little slack coiled next to the device for things that are likely to get moved at a festival,...

My goal is to not have a single cable running in the area where the band stands. anything that needs to run upstage to downstage  is way off to the side, out of site.

Then the bands come in and mess up my purdy stage.

[ProSoundWeb Community]