Battery Powered Lights

Bluewave07

Bluewave07

Active member
Hey guys,
I'm starting filming on a new project in two weeks and the majority of the scenes are going to take place at night and in environments in which we won't have any access to sockets. What do you recommend? I was just at Home Depot and I saw some cheap Halogen Worklights for about $28. Are those going to be good enough. I need alot of light...we'll be filming mostly in alleys. Thanks alot!
 
alot of light + batter powered = impossible

alot of light + generator = hollywood :)
 
Alright, point taken. However, let me redifine "alot." I will need to light one to two people in a single frame at a time. Also, I'm trying to keep alot of the night shots contained so that moving the lights isnt a problem.

That being said,
anyone have any suggestions for lighting a person using battery powered lights?
 
I'm gona say that battery powered isn't going to work too well. You may be able to get the lights real close to the actors, but then your whole frame will not be lit (background) and it will looks fake/bad. Either rent a small generator or get some Edison socket to 2-prong adapters and find some light bulbs you can remove in the ally for a little while.
 
Bluewave07 said:
...anyone have any suggestions for lighting a person using battery powered lights?
Click to expand...

Generators have been mentioned.
You can also run some 100-150W fluorescent lighting or a 150W HID light such as found at alzovideo.com through an inverter with a 300+WH battery. Should give you ~1.5 hours of decent light.
 
In worst case scenarios, where there is no light at all...you can use your car headlights....Granted, you don't have much choice on the height of these lights.
You can place a frosted, shower curtain liner in front of them to soften the pattern. Drive another car down the alley, and park your car at angle that the camera will not see and point your headlights at a wall, perhaps backlighting your actors, or just to provide separation. Renting battery operated lights, renting/buying inverters, asking (nicely) local businesses to offer you their outlets, so you can use your own extension cords(stingers)
Renting a 3000-6500 watt generator may be an option for you, check the rates at your local equipment rental house.
 
Filmat,
I had been thinking about this possibility, but thought that as ambient lighting the headlights might be too strong and sharp of light (i.e. not the soft look I was looking for). To help this though, you would suggest some sort of diffuser? I guess a shower curtain is possible, do you have any other suggestions for something to spread over the lights?? Thanks a lot!!
 
I mentioned the shower curtain since it might be just large enough to cover both headlights at once. This would take away the obvious "Two hard sources" look of headlights , and make it one large soft light. I mention a shower curtain because they are only 2-5 bucks to buy as well.
I have worked on huge budget projects and ones where the crew actually PAID to work on...LOL . Shooting indie style on no budget, is fun sometimes, and it challenges your resources.
Other than the shower liner, you can use fabrics from a fabric store, sheer or opaque materials, which can be cut to fit over the lights.
I prefer one soft source, but depending on what your shooting, you may want one of these lights with less diffusion than the other.
Can you actually use a car as prop, and have your actors stand in front of the car , while it's running(or at least with the lights on) to show where your light is coming from.. ??? You can also buy those really cheap mirrors from ..say a Walmart...( The ones that coe'ds put on the door of their closet in the dorm rooms) I think they are like 12-14" inches wide by 4-5 ft long. You can use these to catch some of the light spill to use as edge lights. You can soften this hard edge by placing some diffusion(a net or silk) between the mirror and the subject....Not the mirror and the car lights.. I would really want you to rent a genny and get some decent lights to shoot this, but I know that budget can get in the way of some shoots.
Big , powerful, re-chargeable spot lights can also help with filming, put you really need to put diffusion over these.... The lights pattern and reflector put out really ugly light.....
 
Good guerrila ideas by filmat11. I've used the car headlight technique, and it is indeed hard to control, but lots of light that lasts a while.

Battery powered spot lights often come with tripod sockes on the bottom. Battery time on these are low. Link 1, Link 2, Link 3

While the throw won't be much, you could buy a set of 5-10 LED shop lights. Battery powered too, and will likely last a long time.
 
Why not get a small inverter and rent a Joker-Bug 200W or 400W, use this with silk or softbox and you would have an excellent solution.
 
The Cheap Route

The Cheap Route

Hi Bluewave,

On the cheap route, I envision using one of those portable high-power (1M+ lumen) spotights that plug into the cigarette lighter,using an umbrella to spread and diffuse them. So I went into my trunk, pulled out the Coleman 800K Halogen and bounced it into a 5 foot umbrella with white satin reflector - the results were disappointing, not enough light was reflected. Out in the garage I spotted a paper/plastic drop cloth and found it made a great diffusion over the spotlight, both spreading and knocking down the hardness to a manageable level.

But not being one to easily give up on idea, I went back inside and grabbed a Lowell DP Brella - the ones with the highly reflective surface. Wow, what a difference, providing a similar effect to the drop cloth but allowing lots of control to model the light (could be during the shoot, too).

Anyway, you might consider using two (key/fill) and see how you like the results, using a cigarette lighter Y splitter. Of course, if you get a 5M+ spotlight just ensure the wattage of both don't exceed the fuse capacity of your cigarette lighter; mine is 15 amp, so at 12 volts the max would be 30 watts/spotlight.

Good luck, Michael
 
moonlitnite said:
... Of course, if you get a 5M+ spotlight just ensure the wattage of both don't exceed the fuse capacity of your cigarette lighter; mine is 15 amp, so at 12 volts the max would be 30 watts/spotlight.
Click to expand...

Actually, a 15 Amp circuit at 12 Volts is 180 Watts (P = E*I), but the thing to worry about is the cold filament in rush current. Don't try and start both (or any number greater than 1) at the same time. Start them in secession allowing a bit of time (1 or 2 seconds) between each.
 
Did you say you have lights? Just no power source and that's why u r looking at batt powered? Renting a small generator @ HomeDepot/Lowes/others might be $30-$50 for the day... you'll need a long extension to get it far it the walls reflecting the sound of it...
Also, you could buy a 400W inverter for $45 online... once again, long extension from the inverter to the lights... then you can have one small tungsten or a couple of halogens... the work lights from home depot fitted with halogen bulbs would be a good idea... coollights.biz has a DVD that shows you how to make them
if anyone has an Alzo 2000 sounds like it would be ideal with a slightly stronger converter... I think you can get inverters that give you more power out of a car, even 2000W... but I'm not sure if all car engines will be able to power these.
 
Monlit, USLatin, khmuse, and everyone that has helped me,

thanks so much for the suggestions. All of them are great and would be feasable suggestions if my budget was a little more extensive. Even renting a generator for $45 / day is far too much. We're still in high school and have a very small budget, most of which I'm trying to spend on getting a good boom mic...

So, I have decided that probably the best solution for my situation is the Headlight routine. I am going to buy a couple frosted shower curtains for diffusing and maybe some mirrors to bounce the light.

Does anyone else have any other suggestions for this strategy? I want soft lighting, but I know that headlights aren't exactly the best way to achieve this...
thanks a lot!!!

Matt
 
get a white curtain... solid white. You'll get less intensity but softer light... you can have the lights on with the car off for takes and run it during setup and in between so don't drain it... two cars two curtains maybe both headlights diffused with one curtain for one car, and on the other one headlight diffused and one reditected with a mirror and through a frosted curtain to smoothen the pattern, maybe double up the frosted curtain by folding it for furder smoothing, bring something to lean the long mirror that was suggested (dorm mirror) onto so you don't have to use a set of hands and so it doesn't shake/move... the more you lean it the higher it will go... and that could be used for the backround onto a wall... make sure the gas tanks are full, you might try to figure out the temperature/color of the headlights for both cars and see if you can get gels that would correct it a bit if needed by taping them right on the headlights but that might not be necessary/worth it if you white balance right?

make sure the guys here don't point out any mistakes/misconceptions of mine before you follow my lighting advice
 
Thanks so much for the advice. This route will undoubtedly save me a bunch of money...I'll get some curtains and post some pictures when we finally start shooting in a couple of weeks. Thanks again!

Matt
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top