TPA3223C Lighting Technology - Curriculum Guide

Course Description

TPA3223C is the theatre lighting course that sits above the introductory level. The statewide title is Lighting Technology and the statewide description is unambiguous about what that means: "advanced study of the lighting equipment, dimmers, control and other electronics used in the theatre." The statewide prerequisite is TPA2200 — the introductory stagecraft or technical theatre course.

The C suffix marks it as an integrated course: lecture plus laboratory in one enrolment. In this subject that is not a formality — you cannot learn to hang, cable, focus and program lights from a book, and the laboratory is where the course actually happens, frequently on the department's own productions.

Three Florida public institutions carry TPA3223C — Florida Atlantic University, the University of Central Florida and the University of South Florida — and one, the University of West Florida, carries the unsuffixed TPA3223 at 3 credits under the exact statewide title.

⚠⚠⚠ Two of the three carriers teach DESIGN under a number the state defines as TECHNOLOGY

This is the most consequential thing in this guide, because in theatre the two are different professions.

Carrier	Its title	Which side
Statewide	Lighting Technology	technology — equipment, dimmers, control, electronics
USF	Technical Theatre Lighting	✅ technology
UWF (bare `TPA3223`)	Lighting Technology	✅ technology — matches the state exactly
⚠ UCF	Lighting Design for Theatre I	⚠⚠ design
⚠ FAU	Lighting Design Topics	⚠⚠ design

Why this is a misfiling rather than ordinary title drift: the state's title and the state's description agree with each other, and Florida already provides separate numbers for lighting design — TPA4020 Lighting Design I (carried by FSU and UF), plus TPA3221, TPA3226, TPA4021, TPA4022 and TPA4024 in the same family. When a dedicated number exists for what an institution is actually teaching, the number in use is the anomaly.

⚠⚠ The distinction is a real division of labour, not an academic quibble

	Lighting technology / electrics	Lighting design
The question	How does this system work, and how do I make it work safely?	What should the audience see, and what should it feel like?
Skills	circuiting, load calculation, cable and connectors, dimming and power distribution, DMX and network protocols, console programming, rigging, maintenance, troubleshooting	script analysis, concept, colour, angle and composition, the light plot and paperwork, collaboration with the director and other designers, cueing
The job	electrician, master electrician, programmer, technical director, venue technician	lighting designer, associate designer
Union	IATSE (stagehands and technicians)	USA Local 829 (designers)
Employment	⚠ steadier, more numerous, better entry wages	⚠ fewer positions, usually freelance, usually reached through electrics work first

⚠⚠⚠ The practical warning: a student who needs the electrics skills and takes a design section will graduate able to draft a plot and unable to get hired to hang it — and in this industry almost everyone's first several jobs are electrics. The reverse error matters less, because the technology course is genuinely foundational to design.

What to do about it. Read your catalog description rather than the title, and ask the department one question: does this course put me on a ladder and hand me a wrench, or does it put me at a drafting table? A good programme will make you do both eventually. ⚠ If you are transferring, send the syllabus — a receiving programme matching by number may assume the state's definition and place you into a design sequence you have not prepared for, or into electrics you have already done.

⚠ The C and the bare number are both real — and this one is not a "phantom" suffix

Three institutions carry TPA3223C and one carries bare TPA3223. Both forms exist and are taught. The practical difference is contact hours: an integrated course normally carries about 60 contact hours for 3 credits against 45 for a lecture-only course, because the laboratory is scheduled. ⚠ This guide is written to the C identifier, so the 60-hour figure describes the integrated form; UWF's unsuffixed version is a 3-credit course and the lab work there is typically met through production assignment instead.

Learning Outcomes

Required Outcomes

Written to the statewide definition — the technology reading. Where your section is a design section, expect the design outcomes in the optional list below to move into the required half.

Work safely with theatrical electricity and at height: lockout/tagout, safe load limits, secondary safety cables on every fixture, ladder and lift procedure, personal protective equipment, and when to stop and call someone.
Explain the electrical fundamentals the work requires — voltage, current, resistance, power; Ohm's law and the power formula; series and parallel circuits — and calculate loads to determine how many fixtures a circuit will carry.
Identify the major fixture types and select appropriately: ellipsoidal reflector spotlights, Fresnels, PARs, cyc and striplights, followspots, and the LED and automated equivalents of each.
Explain LED and automated fixtures specifically — colour mixing systems, why dimming behaves differently from tungsten, and the additional control parameters a moving light requires.
Select and use cable, connectors and distribution correctly: cable gauge and capacity, common connector types, two-fers, multicable, and company switch / power distribution practice.
Explain dimming and power: how dimmers work, dimmer per circuit versus relays, and the power requirements of a modern rig.
Explain and implement control: DMX512 addressing, universes, daisy-chaining and termination, and the basics of network-based control (Art-Net / sACN).
Program a lighting console — patch, record cues, build a cue stack, and run a show from it.
Read a light plot, section and paperwork — channel hookup, instrument schedule, magic sheet — and execute a hang and focus from them.
Execute the process: load-in, hang, circuit, address, focus, cue, tech, run, and strike.
Troubleshoot systematically — isolate whether a dead fixture is lamp, cable, circuit, dimmer, address or console, in that kind of order, rather than by guessing.
Use colour media and templates: gel numbering systems, colour temperature, gobos, and the effect of colour on pigment and skin.
Work professionally in a production team — call and answer on headset, respect the stage manager's authority during a cue-to-cue, and keep to a call time.

Optional Outcomes

Analyse a script and develop a lighting design concept — the core design outcome, and required at the design-framed institutions.
Draft a light plot in Vectorworks or AutoCAD and document it in Lightwright.
Pre-visualise a rig in software (Vectorworks Vision, Capture, WYSIWYG, or a console's built-in visualiser).
Design and execute lighting for a studio production or a scene project.
Work with atmospheric effects, projection or video integration.
Apply lighting practice outside theatre — concert and corporate events, architectural or themed environments.
Serve as master electrician or programmer on a department production.

Major Topics

Required Topics

Safety: electrical, working at height, rigging, and the culture of stopping work when something is wrong.
Electricity for the stage; load calculation.
Light as a medium — intensity, colour, direction, movement — and the standard controllable qualities.
Fixture types, optics and photometrics; reading a photometric chart.
LED and automated fixtures.
Cable, connectors, and power distribution.
Dimming systems.
DMX512, addressing, and network protocols.
Console operation and cue programming.
Paperwork: plot, section, hookup, instrument schedule, magic sheet.
Hang, circuit, focus and the production calendar.
Colour media, gobos and accessories.
Maintenance, inventory and troubleshooting.
Production organisation and the roles in a lighting department.

Optional Topics

Script analysis and design concept development.
Drafting and CAD; Lightwright paperwork.
Pre-visualisation.
Concert, corporate and event lighting.
Themed entertainment and architectural lighting.
Media servers, projection and video.
Dance lighting, which has its own conventions.

Florida-Specific Content

⚠⚠ Florida is one of the best places in the United States to be trained in entertainment lighting, and this deserves emphasis because students frequently assume the work is in New York.

⚠⚠⚠ Themed entertainment. Central Florida holds the world's largest concentration of theme parks — Walt Disney World, Universal Orlando, SeaWorld — and they employ very large permanent entertainment technology departments: show lighting technicians, programmers, maintenance technicians and designers, working on shows, parades, night-time spectaculars and attractions. These are year-round jobs with benefits, which is rare in this industry, and they are a realistic destination for a Florida graduate with electrics skills. ⚠ They hire on demonstrable technical competence and a clean safety record — which is an argument for making sure you get the technology course, whichever number it sits under.
The cruise industry. PortMiami, Port Everglades and Port Canaveral are among the busiest cruise ports in the world, and cruise ships run full production shows with resident lighting technicians. Contracts are a well-established entry route for young technicians.
Live events and touring. Florida's arenas, amphitheatres and convention centres host touring concerts, and the state has substantial corporate and convention event production centred on Orlando — one of the largest convention markets in the country.
Regional and professional theatre — Asolo Repertory (Sarasota), Florida Studio Theatre, the Maltz Jupiter Theatre, Orlando Shakes, GableStage, Zoetic Stage, and the touring houses (the Kravis Center, the Straz Center, the Dr. Phillips Center, the Broward Center), all of which employ IATSE crews.
Practical Florida realities: outdoor venues are common here, which brings heat, humidity, afternoon thunderstorms and lightning into load-in planning; and hurricane season affects venue scheduling and equipment protection. Heat illness is a genuine occupational risk for crews working outdoor load-ins in Florida summer — hydration and rotation are part of the job, not an afterthought.
Unions: IATSE has locals across Florida (including Miami, Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville). ⚠ Ask your instructor how local entry works — the route in is usually by being a reliable overhire first, and the industry runs almost entirely on personal recommendation.

Resources & Tools

The Stage Lighting Handbook (Francis Reid) and Stage Lighting Design: The Art, the Craft, the Life (Richard Pilbrow) — the classics.
Scene Design and Stage Lighting (Parker, Wolf and Block) — the standard survey text in American programmes.
Stage Lighting: The Technicians' Guide (Skip Mort) and Practical Dimming / Practical DMX (Nick Mobsby) — the technology side specifically, and closest to this number's statewide definition.
Electricity for the Entertainment Electrician & Technician (Richard Cadena) — ⚠ the single most relevant book for this course as the state defines it, and the reference for the ETCP electrician certification.
Software: Vectorworks Spotlight (the industry standard for plots; student licences are free), Lightwright (paperwork), and console-manufacturer offline editors and visualisers — ETC Eos and MA Lighting grandMA both publish free offline software, which means you can practise programming on a laptop at no cost. Do it; console fluency is directly employable.
Manufacturer documentation — ETC, Chauvet, Martin and Robe publish free, well-written technical manuals and training material.
USITT (United States Institute for Theatre Technology) — the professional body, with cheap student membership and an annual conference with a large job fair. Its standards documents govern plot graphics.
ETCP (Entertainment Technician Certification Program) — the industry certification for entertainment electricians and riggers. ⚠ It requires documented work experience, so it is a goal for after graduation, but knowing it exists and working toward the hours is a mark of seriousness.
Trade press and community: Lighting&Sound America, Live Design, the Control Booth forums.

Career Pathways

Stage or entertainment electrician (SOC 27-4015 lighting technicians; 49-9099) — the realistic first job, and the foundation of every other route.
Master electrician — running the lighting crew for a production.
Lighting programmer — a specialised, well-paid and increasingly distinct role as rigs grow more complex.
Lighting designer (SOC 27-1027) — usually freelance, usually reached after years of electrics work.
Themed entertainment show technician / show quality technician — ⚠ the Florida speciality above.
Venue or production manager, technical director (SOC 27-2012).
Corporate and event production technician — the largest employer in live events by volume, and it pays better at entry than theatre.
Film and television lighting (SOC 27-4011, 27-4015) — a related but distinct craft with its own union (IATSE Local 600/728 structures) and its own entry route.
Architectural lighting (SOC 17-3029, 27-1025) — a crossover requiring additional study, and better paid and more stable than entertainment work.
Equipment sales, rental and support (SOC 41-4011) — an under-considered and genuinely good career for someone who understands the gear.

⚠ Honest note on the industry. Entertainment technology work is physical, involves nights, weekends and holidays, and much of it is freelance and project-based. Entry wages in theatre are modest; corporate events and themed entertainment pay better. The people who build careers are the ones who are reliable, safe, early, and easy to work with — the technical skills are necessary and they are not what gets you called back. Work on every production you can while you are a student; the credits and the references are the qualification.

Special Information

Prerequisites narrative

The statewide prerequisite is TPA2200, the introductory stagecraft or technical theatre course. ⚠ That number is itself variable across Florida: it is carried as TPA2200 at Daytona State, FAU, Pensacola State, UCF and USF, and as TPA2200C at Broward, St. Petersburg College and UWF — with titles ranging from Stagecraft to Introduction to Technical Theatre to Introduction to Production, and credits from 2 to 4. Many programmes also expect TPA2220 Introduction to Stage Lighting (carried at Broward, CF, FIU, St. Johns River and USF) before this course.

Practically: you should have had hands on equipment before this course. If you have not — if you are coming from another major or from a programme that placed you differently — say so in week one rather than in week six. Departments would far rather know.

⚠ Some sections are restricted to theatre majors, and some require concurrent production crew assignment. Check the catalog.

Credits and contact hours

All three TPA3223C carriers offer it at 3 semester credits; UWF's unsuffixed TPA3223 is also 3. No Florida institution publishes a contact-hour figure. The 60 hours given here is derived by the Florida convention for a 3-credit integrated (C) course — 45 hours would be the lecture-only figure, and this identifier is the integrated form.

⚠⚠ Both figures understate the real commitment substantially, and this is the most important practical fact in this section. Where the course is attached to a department production, load-in, focus and technical rehearsals run evenings and weekends and are not optional — a tech week can consume thirty hours. Ask for the production calendar before you register, and do not schedule a job against tech week.

Course-code variation across Florida

⚠⚠ Theatre lighting is the most fragmented subject this catalog has examined. The statewide `TPA` list contains more than twenty-five active lighting numbers across lower division, upper division and graduate level — including four separate numbers titled some version of Lighting Design I. Of 414 distinct `TPA` identifiers carried by Florida public institutions, 324 are offered at exactly one school.

The ones with actual Florida public carriers:

TPA2220 Introduction to Stage Lighting — Broward, CF, FIU, St. Johns River, USF. The lower-division entry point.
TPA3223C / TPA3223 Lighting Technology — this course; FAU, UCF, USF (C) and UWF (bare).
TPA4020 Lighting Design I — FSU and UF. ⚠ The number the state provides for design, and two major programmes use it.
TPA3221, TPA3226, TPA4022 — all titled some form of Lighting Design, no Florida public carrier.

⚠ A curiosity worth noting as a caution about reading state records literally: the statewide title of TPA4024 is recorded as "LIGHTING DESIGN 11" — almost certainly a transcription of "II". Treat statewide titles as data entered by people, not as authoritative prose.

Because of this fragmentation, transfer in this subject should be handled by portfolio and syllabus, not by number. Theatre programmes are used to evaluating work directly — bring the plots you drafted, the paperwork you produced, the productions you crewed and the positions you held. That evidence outweighs a transcript line in this field.

Dual enrolment and high school credit

SCNS marks this number available for dual enrolment with elective high school credit. ⚠ Here the field is discriminating rather than boilerplate: five of the 289 active `TPA` numbers carry Performing Fine Arts high-school credit — TPA2000, TPA2210, TPA2220, TPA3230 and TPA3231 — and this course is not among them. A dual-enrolled student who needs performing/fine arts credit for high school graduation should look at TPA2220 (Introduction to Stage Lighting) instead, which carries it and is the natural precursor anyway. Confirm with your counsellor and your district's articulation agreement, which governs the actual award.

Transferability

SCNS records guaranteed transfer to an institution offering the same course. With the fragmentation described above, rely on the portfolio route rather than the guarantee.

Position in the curriculum

Upper division, after introductory technical theatre and usually after introductory lighting. It is the gateway to advanced design courses and, more importantly, to being trusted with real responsibility on department productions — which is what actually builds the résumé.

AI Integration

AI tools have arrived in entertainment lighting, and the useful thing this course can teach is a clear sense of which parts of the work they touch.

Where they help: explaining an electrical or DMX concept a second way; generating practice load calculations to check yourself against; drafting paperwork templates and spreadsheet formulas; writing scripts for show-control or console macros; and summarising a long manufacturer manual to find the section you need.

Where they fail — and one failure is a genuine safety matter:

⚠⚠⚠ Do not rely on a model for a load calculation, a circuit capacity or an electrical code question. It will produce a confident, well-formatted, plausible number, and a wrong answer here is not a bad grade — it is an overloaded circuit, a fire, or someone hurt. Electrical capacity is determined by the equipment specification, the venue's distribution and the applicable code, verified by a qualified person. Do the arithmetic yourself and have it checked; that is exactly what this course exists to teach you to do.
⚠⚠ The same applies to rigging and load ratings. Never accept a generated number for anything that hangs above a person.
Equipment specifications are fabricated. Beam angles, lumen output, power draw, DMX channel maps and connector types are exactly the kind of specific fact models invent. Go to the manufacturer's cut sheet — they are free, authoritative and one search away.
Console programming advice is frequently wrong or version-mismatched. Consoles differ substantially and change with software releases. Use the manufacturer's documentation and offline editor.
⚠ Design is not generation. Image generators produce lighting-like pictures that cannot be realised — angles no position affords, colour a real gel does not make, intensity ratios a real rig cannot hold. They can be useful for communicating a mood to a director, provided everyone knows the image is a reference and not a promise. Pre-visualisation software, which models real fixtures in a real venue, is the tool that actually predicts what you will get.

Where AI is genuinely changing the craft: automated fixture calibration and pixel-mapping content generation, camera-based tracking systems, and content tools in media servers. These are worth knowing about — but they sit on top of the fundamentals this course teaches, and a technician who does not understand the underlying system cannot fix it when it fails on a show night.

Academic integrity and professional responsibility. Follow your institution's policy and disclose AI use where required. The professional standard is simpler and harsher: in this field you sign for the work, and "the software said so" is not a defence that exists after an incident.