Set Building Workshop
LOCATION: Upriver Studios 1 Tomsons Road, Saugerties, NY
IMPORTANT DATES:
May 25: Application Deadline – 5pm
May 25 – June 1: Interviews
June 3: Acceptance Announcement
June 6: Registration Fee Due
June 10: Workshop Begins
Registration Fee: $850 $699 Special offer!
Full and partial scholarships are available.
Are you someone who enjoys working with your hands and can’t stand the idea of sitting behind a desk all day? Learn the skills needed to work on set from industry professionals in our first-ever, in-person Set Building Workshop!
ABOUT WORKSHOP:
SCHEDULE:
June 10: 4pm-8:30pm
June 11: 8am-5pm
June 12: 8am-5pm
June 24: 4pm-8pm
June 25: 8am-5pm
June 26: 8am-5pm
This 6-day workshop will help trainees deepen their building skills and apply them to work within the Art Department on a production.
This workshop will provide trainees with:
Hands-on training experience in film/TV set building techniques and concepts
Confidence so that graduates feel prepared to work within the art department on an actual set
Techniques for collaborating and working with an art director, and other key departments
An understanding of departmental roles and operations
Knowledge of what set building entails
Upon successful completion of this workshop, participants will be referable for assistant positions on upcoming film and television productions.
Pre-requisites: A basic familiarity with power tools and hand tools, along with the ability to climb a ladder and lift moderately heavy objects.
Stockade Works is particularly seeking diverse members of the community and women who are typically precluded from jobs in the film production sector.
Applications from those 16-18 years of age will be considered to audit on a case by case basis.
Workshop is limited to 16 participants.
INSTRUCTORS:
Sean Hawk has been swinging a hammer since he was a boy and has built houses, furniture, churches, restaurants, boats, guitars, props, sets for Off Broadway, Broadway, feature films, episodic TV and everything in between. As a grateful member of Local 52 he has worked as a carpenter on shows and films such as the Producers, Sex and the City, Law and Order, the Sopranos, 30 Rock, Nurse Jackie, Zoolander, Orange is the New Black, Boardwalk Empire, HBOs Pretty Little Liars and more.
Annie Simeone Morales is a New York based Production Designer working in the Film and TV industry since 2007. Her background in ceramics, sculpture, classical painting, art history and science bring a multidisciplinary approach and distinctive eye to her set designs. Her design work can be seen in the 2019 SXSW premiered comedic-thriller, VILLAINS for BRON Studios, the feature adaptation of the period musical, HELLO AGAIN as well as the psychological drama, BRAID, which premiered at the 2018 Tribeca Film Festival, and she most recently designed the UNTITLED RAY ROMANO PROJECT. She also recently served as the Art Director on Ryan Murphy’s feature film THE BOYS IN THE BAND, as well as the Netflix series DASH & LILY.
Bill Chesser has been a resident of the Hudson Valley for most of his life. He graduated from Syracuse University’s School of Visual and Performing Arts and has been building scenery since 1998. In 2005, he transferred his union membership to the I.A.T.S.E. Local 480 Motion Picture Studio Mechanics Union. From 2005 to 2011 he built sets as a carpenter and sculptor for movies and television shows including Breaking Bad, Marvel Studios’ The Avengers, Thor, and many more. In 2011 Bill moved back to Upstate NY and worked in local scenery shops again. He became a project manager at Bernhard Link Theatrical for four years, a company that specializes in lighting and building scenery for New York City’s Fashion Week, and corporate events for clients including Tiffany and Co. and Macy’s. In 2018, Bill went back into the film industry as a carpenter for I.A.T.S.E. Local 52 Motion Picture Studio Mechanics Union. With them, he has worked on John Wick 3, Joker, The Gilded Age, and most recently Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin. Bill was initiated into Local 52 on April 9th, 2022.
Chris Herrera is a Motion Picture Studio Technician with Local 52. Originally from Patchogue, Long Island. Currently residing in Greeley, PA. He is actively working towards my goal of becoming a Key Grip.
Elsa Rinde is a Scenic and Production Designer based in Brooklyn. She holds an M.F.A in scenic design from the Yale School of Drama, where she was a recipient of the Donald and Zorka Oenslager Fellowship Award in Design. She also holds a B.A. in theater from Barnard College. She is a local 829 member, and currently works as an Assistant Art Director. Recent TV credits include Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin (HBO) and Extrapolations (Apple TV). Production design credits include the short films: An Occurrence at Arverne, Roost, Vuka, Dodge is Dead and ¡Topes!. Art directing credits include Hangdog, Columbarium, Jack and Jill and Candace. She previously worked as an art department assistant and clearance coordinator on multiple television shows including The Deuce (HBO), The Sinner (NBCU), Gotham (WB), and Elementary (CBS).
Marcele Mitscherlich is a professional Scenic artist, Designer, and Multimedia Artist who has been working in theater and film in NYC for over 25 years. She is a proud member of United Scenic Artist Local 829 New York City and earned her BFA in sculpture from the School of Visual Arts NYC. Her Broadway credits include Book of Mormon, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Les Miserable, Pippin, King Kong and Finding Neverland. She worked on Television Shows such as Sesame Street, Sound of Music Live and Peter Pan Live. In addition, she has helped create the Christmas windows for Saks with Avenue and Macy’s, and has been featured in the New York Times. Marcele lives in New Paltz with her 3 children, and her most recent Episodic Television work includes Apple TV’s Severance and HBO’s Pretty Little Liars ‘Original Sin’.
Deana LeBlanc was born in Kingston, NY. She graduated from Bard College in 2015 with a B.S. in Film Production. While at Bard, Deana began volunteering every year at the Woodstock Film Festival where she met Laurent Rejto and became connected with the Hudson Valley Film Commission. Getting to know the crew and talent in this community led to opportunities to work locally on numerous films. She worked as a Set P.A, Office PA, Set Dresser, Locations Scout, Carpenter, Production Designer, actor and casting scout, before finding a home in the Scenic Department.
Jeffrey Francis is a Poughkeepsie resident and participant in previous Stockade Works trainings including their Bootcamp, Camera Workshop and Grip/Electric Workshop. Francis has since worked as a construction grip for features filmed here in the Hudson Valley.
John Ashton has worked in the film business as a set dresser and property master for over 20 years.
Tom Newton started working in the film business in NYC in 1985. From then until 2019, he worked primarily as a prop and SPFX person on TV commercials. Between 2010 and 2019 he worked solely on commercials, doing a lot of tabletop, mostly for food products. In 2019 he moved from the commercial side of the business to TV and worked doing SPFX on Emergence, a TV series from ABC. From 2019 to 2020 he worked in the SPFX department on The Gilded Age series from HBO. In February 2021 he worked on the series Wu Tang Clan—An American Saga season 2 doing SPFX, and from August 2021 to the present he has been working on Pretty Little Liars as the set dressing shop foreman. he is also a musician, sound engineer, and published author.
Stockade Works believes that film, media, and tech should be accessible for all people. If an accessibility offering such as American Sign Language Interpretation, live captioning, audio descriptions or a post event transcript would aid in your participation, please let us know.