Best Away From Outlet/Battery Powered Light Kit Under 2000$?

[Robertofish]

I am looking into getting an LED or other battery powered light kit for under 2 grand, what would you suggest, the reason I do not want to buy a Generator instead is because, its not a clean source of energy, and I would have to keep buying gas for it, this way I can just recharge the batteries and be good to go! I would like to get a standard 3 point light kit with batteries, what are the solutions for battery power if I get the LED lights, I have heard Bescor Bricks are an option as well as NP1s? The goal is to have lights that can last a full film day outside no where near an outlet! Any suggestions?

 

[MPB]

i think a lot of the larger led panels are frequently available with v-mount, though you could probably get them, or adapt them, with other mounts, or maybe they can be fed with 4-pin xlr. the investment in a battery system is, as you suggest, an important consideration now, and further down the road. i'm a fan of v-mount, but a lot of suppliers sell their batteries with your choice of interface.

Bescor is certainly one of the big battery suppliers. you might also look at Batteries4Broadcast or Rathbone. they make good batteries and chargers at pretty competitive prices. i've also been pleased with the after-sale service i've received from B4B.

oh yeah, B4B also sells a line of led panels, though i have no experience with them.

 

[Norman99]

"To last a full film day outside"..?
How many hours are in a film day ?
How bright is outside ? noontime without clouds or dusk just after sunset?
Let's assume that the led lights will be on at full power for a total of 2 hours and you have a "kit" of 3 lights. Let's also assume the "outside" is overcast say F11 without any ND filter and
0db gain on a fairly sensitive sensor(s). If the led lights are at an average of 8 to 12 feet away from the subject, then each led will have to have a minimum lux value of 1200 at 3 metres (10ft.) to be effective at least as fill/hairlight/key. At that brightness, and assuming the led units deliver each 8000 lux @ 3 feet (1 meter) and consuming 75 watts ( roughly).
Then the total wattage or power consumption for the day ( based on 2 hours led time) is roughly 3 lights X 75 watts X 2 hours = 450 watts. If the batteries are rated at 50 watt hr. each, then a total of 9 batteries are needed ( 3 for each light). If the batteries are the hi capacity li-ion type in V mounts and rated for 100 watt hour each, then 5 batteries will do.
Cost of high cap batteries especially for pro use v mount can be high. The batteries alone may be over your 2K budget not including special chargers. Another viable alternative is a couple of deep cycle marine batteries. Much less expensive and heavier. If that shoot is more like 4 hours, then more will be needed.
Outside light is very bright and more often than not the HMI's with generators are the tools of choice. Leds may not be bright enough even at 8 feet away, especially for shadow fill on a sunny day. You may want to try out some different units before your final decision. The key word here is brightness level, unless the "outside" is on the dark side.

 

[Robertofish]

Well now that I think about it in most cases the lights are for outdoor at night time when there are no lights or outlets around, and the moonlight isnt enough, so 4 hours would be good enough most likely, what led lights would you recommend, I looked at Batteries4broadcast, and they have a 12x12 50 watt usage light for 1 grand which isnt to bad, with 2 190wh batteries and a charger for around 2100 I think, this is good but I think I need 2 more lights less powerful that would run off the same batteries, I'm hoping it will be less money then that but if need be I will spend it, any suggestions, doing the math(190x2)/50 7.6 hours for one 50 watt light so I could probably do less wattage lights for the remainder if we do 4 hours at once.

 

[Norman99]

The 135 fc (foot candle) rating at 4 feet equates to 1647 lux at 4 feet. That, in my opinion is around a 150 watt tungsten filament in brightness. Depending on the subject to light distance and your camera settings , Fstop/shutter speed/gain, the light(s) may not be bright enough at distances over 20 feet. Then again, you can always move them closer if necessary. Putting 3 of them together will not triple the brightness, as the inverse square law requires 4X the amount of light to gain double brightness or 1 F stop. Drawing 50 watts seems about right for the brightness rated. The 190 watt/hour batteries seem very good for the price, as most pro Vmount same capacity or less go for well over 700 each. If you will be doing many more shoots in the future, then I recommend those batteries as they are the highest capacity V mounts available. If it is a one time shoot, perhaps renting is best. There are a lot of variables involved in any shoot and often one goes by overrated specs only to discover that more lights, or more powerful ones, are needed. If the shoot is a one time event or very important, then equipment tryout well in advance is mandatory, especially if the new equipment will be used for the first time.

 

[Robertofish]

The only reason I would want 3 is for 3 point lighting not to triple the brightness, also what would you suggest for a hair light, is there a hair light and boom you can get for led or is there some way to use a regular florescent light with the batteries, they are usually rated around 25-50 watts for a good hair light and boom which isnt to bad,

Here are the links to the led light I was talking about
http://www.batteries4broadcast.com/led.htm
Its a 12x12 rated at 50 watts max, is dimable to 5% and has 3200-5600k with a turn of a knob, what do you think of this lighting system cause I dont know to much about led, is it any good, along with that I would get this
http://www.batteries4broadcast.com/vmc11.htm
The 190wh 2 pack with charger, so thats around 2175 for both, so now I think the price has gone up to 3 grand if I choose to add other lights,

Any suggestions for hair light with boom for led or could I somehow use a regular light?

 

[morgan_moore]

the reason I do not want to buy a Generator instead is because, its not a clean source of energy,

So burn some fosil fuel in a power station, send it down miles of cable to your house, losing a percentage of it on the way, charge up a battery made from horrible chemicals that some day you will dump, polluting the land, use energy moving those batteries about and then do your lighting

Versus burn some fosil fuels on the spot to drive your lights

There are many reasons not to want a genny, (noise,mass,cost), but I doubt environmental concerns are one of those reasons..

 

[Robertofish]

Umm, ok thats the problem with the forum it seems that everyone just wants to start an argument about things, when all I want is some advice, can people just accept that I dont want a generator? While I understand what you are saying its still not quite correct, you can do solar chargers for things which is wasting NOTHING there are many other reasons that statement is not correct but I didn't come here to argue, I came here to get advice on lights, what do you suggest for an led hair light with boom?

 

[morgan_moore]

Sorry - fair point

I would suggest VLock batts and Litepanels or a cheaper copy of a Litepanels as approprate to your budget

Lite panels make a little light that is about 8 inches by three, thats a typical hair light, for LED shooting ie it is correct against a 1X1 for key, but IMO too gutless until it gets dark or you are indoors

http://www.litepanels.com/language/pages/miniplus.php

If you fly you should check up on flight regs for batts (I think keep individual units under 100 w/hr)
If you operate close to a vehicle you could investigate a leisure battery which will give you more w/hrs/$ than Vlock - but are bloody heavy -useless for hiking
Ive also heard rumour of using the batts that run Kessler crane motors for LEDs - http://www.bescor.com/12v-Shoulder-SLA-Batteries.htm

S

 

[ggrantly]

Roberto,

You may not want a generator, but getting enough lighting using battery power, and getting those batteries recharged off the grid just isn't realistic. This isn't about argument, it's about what won't work despite your desire and inclination.

If you hope to have any success with this endeavor, the first thing you need to do is become familiar with ohms law. For the watts you need to make any solar recharge work, you will need a sunny climate, a truck to carry your panels, and lots of time. Realistically, nothing short of hmi lighting is going to do much for you outside and that will take much more power than smallish led lights.

I use a Cool Lights LED600 with a Bescor brick. It works great, but won't do anything like what you want. Possibly the 1200 version would make a modest fill light on a cloudy day, but you will need more batteries and more charging to make this work. And for hmi or flo lighting, you will need inverter-battery setup to make AC power, make that a truck full of batteries.

When I owned a marine repair machine shop business, we did a lot of off the grid power systems, so if you want to get into specifics, I'll be glad to help, but first you need ohms law, and reasonable expectations.

Grant

 

[Grug]

I've got a couple of cheap ($275 each) 700 LED panels with v-mounts on the back that I'm rather in love with. You just whack a v-mount battery (which costs as much as the damn light does) on the back of it, and then you can move the lights around without any cabling issues - it's wonderfully fast and I get something like 4 hours of continuous light on full power.

You just need minus green gels on the lights to correct the colour tint, but that's it really.

 

[Robertofish]

I understand ohms law the reason I was talking about the solar power wasnt for the higher end batteries more to demonstrate that not all energy is harmful so I do understand that doing solar power for large batteries would be rather impossible. I know its not about argument it just seems that people like to argue on this forum about peoples decisions in regards to audio and video preferences, instead of giving advice based on the individuals preferences who are asking, we are all different and like different technologies and things, basically like me asking what Nikon lens and someone saying Canon is better when they should reply with I like this lens, thats all. @Grug what are the 275 each led lights that you have? Also would it be possible to power 2 lights with v mount batteries? 190w/h is very good for one light powering it for 2 would work as well!

 

[Norman99]

From what I understand is that you need a hairlight at night, on a boom, a fill light ( at least), and all run on batteries to run approx 4 hours. The run time is not the problem but the brightness levels that are required. The run time can be solved by bringing more batteries. The brightness depends on SUBJECT TO LIGHT SOURCE DISTANCE. Distance is the killer here. For distances of 10 feet or less, many led units will do nicely. The hairlight can be at shorter distance ( sometimes a few feet away and hidden by the head ) if need be. If you are lighting a single subject with fill, or key, at full length, then a more powerful led unit is needed. If a chest up shot is needed, then a shorter distance from light to subject will most likely be done with a unit of similar to the hair light unit. It all depends on what you want to do ( or most often need to do) that will dictate how powerful light are required. Sure, you can gain up to 18db and introduce grain if you are shooting a group at distances of over 30 feet. Lighting choices are one of the most difficult purchasing decisions to make. What is adequate for an immediate shoot now will perhaps not be sufficient for future assignments. It is always best to have more output brightness than needed. Starting with 2 good lights for now and add a third one later. A good starting point is a flood led unit of MINIMUM 3000 lux at 3 feet ( 1meter) and a narrower beam for the hair light. The hair light can also be a less powerful unit BUT at a shorter distance. You can, for example, go for a really powerful main fill ( where most of the money will go) and a smaller ( 1200 lux or more) hair light. Later on you can add another large unit if necessary. Check out Coolights, great service.

 

[White Hot Josh]

Roberto,

You may not want a generator, but getting enough lighting using battery power, and getting those batteries recharged off the grid just isn't realistic. This isn't about argument, it's about what won't work despite your desire and inclination.

Norman99’s lux calculations are great, but fail to take into account that LEDs require color correction gels and diffusion in order to get decent light quality – all of which will knock the output down by a half or more. For example, see this thread (http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?285826-Studio-set-up-New-3000-led-light-at-CRI-gt-95/page2) where TheDingo says:

Color wise I've rarely had a problem with LED lights, but I do color balance any new light with their own gel pack that I keep permanently attached to the light. The cheaper LED lights tend to have a green or blue spike which you have to gel to control, and every LED light is different, sometimes even from the same manufacturer, but if you figure out the proper gel pack, you are good to go.

Also keep in mind that you must diffuse LED lights just like a open-face tungsten light if you want to get soft gradation and smooth highlights from them.

Besides the now well established deficiencies in their color output that require heavy gelling, as TheDingo points out in his post, you also have to use diffusion on them to avoid the unattractive hundreds of tiny shadows you get from LED Arrays. After correcting their color and diffusing their output, you aren’t left with much output. And, after all that, if you want to add gels for color effect (adding CTB for Moonlight for instance) the use of CC gels on LEDs have unintended and undesirable consequences. Where you know what to expect when you put a color correction gel, say CTO, on HMI or Tungsten lights, you don’t know what you will get putting that same gel on an LED light (see http://www.screenlightandgrip.com/html/emailnewsletter_generators.html#anchorHigh Output AC LEDs for details.)

I choose to use HMIs because I know what the result is going to look like. Yes, they're hot. Yes, they're bulky. Yes, they draw a lot of power. But, I know what the result is going to look like and don't have to give some post pro a bagful of money to straighten out what the LED's screwed up. This isn't about argument, it's about what won't work despite your desire and inclination. You may not want a generator, but getting enough output from LEDs to light a night exterior shot larger than a close up just isn't realistic. A 7500W modified Honda EU6500is, on the other hand, can power an HMI/Kino package that will light up a large night exterior without difficulty.

White Hot Josh

 

[ggrantly]

"Besides the now well established deficiencies in their color output that require heavy gelling, as TheDingo points out in his post, you also have to use diffusion on them to avoid the unattractive hundreds of tiny shadows you get from LED Arrays. After correcting their color and diffusing their output, you aren’t left with much output. And, after all that, if you want to add gels for color effect (adding CTB for Moonlight for instance) the use of CC gels on LEDs have unintended and undesirable consequences. Where you know what to expect when you put a color correction gel, say CTO, on HMI or Tungsten lights, you don’t know what you will get putting that same gel on an LED light (see http://www.screenlightandgrip.com/ht...Output AC LEDs for details."

"I choose to use HMIs because I know what the result is going to look like. Yes, they're hot. Yes, they're bulky. Yes, they draw a lot of power. But, I know what the result is going to look like and don't have to give some post pro a bagful of money to straighten out what the LED's screwed up. This isn't about argument, it's about what won't work despite your desire and inclination. You may not want a generator, but getting enough output from LEDs to light a night exterior shot larger than a close up just isn't realistic. A 7500W modified Honda EU6500is, on the other hand, can power an HMI/Kino package that will light up a large night exterior without difficulty."

+1 to that, in particular with regards to daylight, but unfortunately this is way outside the OP budget. (Hmm, looks like Josh plagerized me a bit with his comment)



"Roberto,

You may not want a generator, but getting enough lighting using battery power, and getting those batteries recharged off the grid just isn't realistic. This isn't about argument, it's about what won't work despite your desire and inclination."

When I made that comment, it was the summary before the analysis. I like my LED600, it serves a purpose, but it won't do what the OP wanted for all sorts of reasons, that's the point. If you wanted the best $2000 LED kit, I'd probably buy a LED1200 and a couple of LED600 from Cool Lights, and add some Bescor bricks or whatever other batteries make sense, and that would bring you close to the $2000 budget. But it won't do 4 hours without more batteries, and it certainly won't hack it for daylight.

Grant