Cool Lights BlackLines

Richard, I've been following your posts with interest and am especially inrterested in the CL455PMD and 655PMD's and the traveling case.


My biggest concern frankly is service. Where do i have to send these things if there is a problem, and what happens if you don't manage to survive as a business that long? With Kino's I know that they can be be repaired now, and a long time into the future.
I guess the made in China thing scares me as to quality control as well.

How would you answer those questions?


Also how long will you maintain the Promotional prices on those units.
 
Hi Lenilenapi,

I definitely have opinions on the Made in China issue and on service just a few facts to offer.

On service:

We had a 3% failure rate on several hundred fixtures this year. Our repairman is about as lonely as the Maytag repairman (if you remember that series of spots from a long time ago). Anyway, that's pretty good reliability. If the unit is DOA just after you receive it, we have an RMA process that doesn't cost you anything and UPS comes to pick up the unit and we ship you another one. After 60 days, you send in the unit at your expense to us. Our service depot is in Oklahoma City. If we can't fix it we swap it out. Our warranty is one year. If the unit is damaged in shipment by UPS, the claim is between them and you as we take care in packing the goods. No one has lost money on a damaged shipment. Kino and many other vendors have the exact same policy on damage in shipment by the way, you can see it on their site(s).

On Quality Control in China:

I've said many times before. Its an over generalization to say that quality in China is bad. You can get any level of quality you like here in China as long as you're willing to manage it. If you get some bad goods in the USA from China you can blame the seller for not managing the process correctly or specifying what he wanted. That's why I spend most all of the year over here now, watching over not only the R&D process but also the quality level.

Once upon a time, Made in Japan was subject to a stigma. That all changed in the seventies when Japanese goods began to not only increase in quality but surpassed American goods in value for the money. China is on that same track. So its old news that "Made in China" means bad quality. It's only that way if you don't have someone picky watching over it all like I do. By the way, Japan has been shifting their manufacturing capacity over to China for quite some time now. Your Japanese camera is very likely made in China. All this has to do with the price of land and wages in Japan going up and up and up. The Japanese simply manage the process just like I do.

Also, no matter where something claims to be made, it's all anecdotal anyway. You have no proof one way or the other. The processes inside of a company are not transparent and the company and its products are a black box to the outside world. Maybe your uncle knows a friend, who has a friend who works there and they say with 100% certainty its made in the USA. I say you still don't have any proof. In addition, where did the parts come from? Was final assembly in the USA. Was it all assembled in China and they slapped a "Made in the USA or Germany" sticker on it? There is no agency to verify that. No customs agent charged at the border with verifying it. At least in our case you know where we make it as why would we lie about being made in China? Do you know with 100% certainty where a Kino Flo unit (or an Arri fresnel for that matter) is made?

All you have is the actual goods in front of you, the reputation they've created in the market, how they perform for you, etc. So, that being said, I would submit, it is irrelevant where something is actually made. What is relevant is the history and reputation of that particular article and not generalizations about everything being made in a certain country or whatever. Hope this helps.
 
Thanks Richard,
What about the question of - since you are a new company, what will my repair recourse be if you don't really survive.
As an example I have an old ultralight version of a 200W minimole. I like the unit. its well made and I liked it more than the mole. However when a Fresnel broke I was unable to get a replacement in the right size. seems silly but I can't find it.
I'm not saying this to be negative or convince anyone else to avoid your company. Its the opposite, I like what your doing and would like to buy a Diva lite at nearly half the cost. Just don't want to be a sad sack five years fromn now when i need a repair and there is nowhere to go. Is this something anyone could fix with easily available parts?

Convince me baby.

- Lenny
 
Lenilenapi said:
Thanks Richard,
What about the question of - since you are a new company, what will my repair recourse be if you don't really survive.
As an example I have an old ultralight version of a 200W minimole. I like the unit. its well made and I liked it more than the mole. However when a Fresnel broke I was unable to get a replacement in the right size. seems silly but I can't find it.
I'm not saying this to be negative or convince anyone else to avoid your company. Its the opposite, I like what your doing and would like to buy a Diva lite at nearly half the cost. Just don't want to be a sad sack five years fromn now when i need a repair and there is nowhere to go. Is this something anyone could fix with easily available parts?

Convince me baby.

- Lenny
Click to expand...

That's more a function of standardized part sizes then whether he'd be around. As far as I know, the fresnels all are nearly perfect Arri knockoffs (perhaps they went off patent?) and therefore, you should be able to order replacement lenses or barn doors without issue.

As for the Chinos, what's going to break? If you drop them off a 4-story building or run them over, that's not a warranty issue. If the cabling comes loose, then pop them open and fix it. Of nearly any tech in filmmaking, lighting has to be the ground floor basic.

Remember, and with no disrespect at all to Richard, he isn't inventing anything (as far as I understand it), but rather going out there and getting amazing prices and custom-configuring quality parts. Thus, he isn't dictating any sizes or stuff, it's all out there.
 
Right Shawneous, we're trying to stay as standard as possible while still realizing some improvements. The blacklines have subtle differences and even improvements in them, but not where it shouldn't be different such as in accessory holder or lens size or type of bulb used. No patent covers that. There's no way to lock people out of using 112mm or 130mm lenses or the same size bulbs in other fresnel designs if they want to. For instance the base of the 650w unit is slightly deeper than an Arri so we can use different sizes of bulbs for different configurations we'll be selling.

So let's go down the list and see how you'd repair them if Cool Lights isn't around to help for some reason. These are listed in the order of most likely to malfunction.

#1 Wiring. The number one problem we have is a wire comes lose. Its so easy to fix given the knowledge of what to look for. Most all ballasts (from the cheapest to the most expensive and doesn't matter where they are made) have these punch in connectors. Occasionally a wire doesn't get inserted and lock in place correctly. It can come lose in shipment. Findable with a bit of deductive trouble shooting and an ohm meter. Power cords in all our fixtures are pretty easy to replace. Wherever possible, we use IEC adapters so the power cord can easily be changed out not only if it malfunctions but also if someone in another country wants to replace the power cord with the one they normally use in their country.

#2 Switches. Switches break. When they do, no power gets to the internal components. Again, really easy to find with an ohm meter and replacements are easily available in the open market. We use standard sizes so you just fine one like the one we used if we're not there to replace it for you.

#3 Ballasts. We use standard T5HO ballasts available in the market. Its so easy to just buy a FT55 type (2x55w) ballast from Advance, Universal, Phillips, Osram, etc. and just replace what we've got in the unit. Literally unscrew the ballast from the chassis, unplug the wires and replug in the wires in the new ballast and reattach to the chassis with the two screws.

#4 Bulbs. We're not using anything proprietary. You get a set of Cool Lights 55w tubes or whatever appropriate bulb with your fixture (except for the 575w HMI fresnel which currently does not include bulb but uses standard HMI HR type) but there's no reason you have to continue to use ours when they wear out. You can get 55w tubes from just about anywhere from Kino to Osram, GE, Phillips and many others. We use all the same bulbs as the arri fresnels. The bulb in the CDM 150w is just a G12 HQI or HCI (Osram) type 150w metal halide of a fairly high CRI. Can be found elsewhere and from other manufacturers.

#5 Sockets. We haven't had any socket failures as of yet. But we use all standard types in the flo's and fresnels. 2G11 in the 55w flos. Mogul screw in base in our 200w CFL softbox fixture (CL-SFT1). G6.35 in the 150w tungsten, GY9.5 in the 300w and 650w tungsten fresnels, G22 in the 1000w tungsten and 575w HMI fresnels. G12 in the 150w cdm fresnel. The likelihood of a socket failure given their sturdy porcelain construction is very unlikely but even so easy to replace.

The tungsten fresnels really are ridiculously simple when you get right down to it. Not so much to go wrong with them. You literally have a power cord, switch, porcelain interface connector, socket and finally bulb in the circuit.

Recently there were some issues with a competitors "Blueline" fresnels having a wiring problem where the wire was either not protected from heat inside the fresnel or vastly underrated. Regardless of where they bought the units for sale in the USA, its ultimately the seller's fault if there's a problem for not specifying what they expect and checking to make sure it happened. It's really not so expensive to get a better grade of wire, use teflon or other types of heat protection on the wire, and also to make sure you've used the correct gauge of wire given the wattage going into the fresnel.

As far as the quality of the fresnel fixture itself. I rate it as extremely high workmanship. Stand adapters are plastic (150w, 300w and 650w units) but so it is on the Arri as well. Aluminum is pretty much aluminum and these things are constructed of aluminum castings and extrusions so that's not something that's going to wear out. They've been anodized or powder coated so there won't be oxidation problems and should stay attractive for years to come as long as they're relatively taken care of. The lens is a high quality of borosilicate as you would expect in most fresnels. Standard sizes easy to find if they broke. All the accessory holders are standard sizes. The barndoors rotate in the accessory holder as you would expect. The barndoors on all our fixtures usually stick in place well but if you happen to get one that doesn't it's usually just a screw driver tightening operation to get them more "sticky." The fresnel focusing mechanism uses a standard ball bearing lined screw drive. A bit of petroleum jelly lubrication every now and then might be welcome but I've never had do it personally as they come with adequate lubrication from the factory that should last a long time.

Ultimately, it really is a good idea to learn to repair your own lights--or to have someone around you with that skillset (a really good electrician / gaffer type). I've said it many times. The best warranty or lack thereof (or eventually your fixtures are out of warranty) in the world won't help you on any brand when you're on set in the middle of capturing a moment, you've got tons of people on the payroll and one or two lights malfunction, every one will be looking to get that going again and there will be pressure. It's probably just a bulb but if it isn't who will you depend upon to get going again. Arri isn't coming to your set to fix the lights and we can't either. You can send them in later but that won't help you now.

Ultimately each person needs to decide how they'll handle this moment, the level of skill they can apply to keeping calm (while others are panicking and getting upset) and troubleshooting and perhaps even having a backup plan too so things can keep running (but with the proper skills you can also repair the malfunctioning light while the backup is running). It really does wonders for your confidence level to not have to depend upon others that may not even be present to be able to fix things. The next best thing is to have such a person on the payroll if you have a serious money-making operation.

Cool Lights has been all about not only lowering the price of poker in lighting but also about demystifying and debunking the way these things have all been treated as "black boxes" in the name of keeping them costly. Mostly we specialize in ballast-oriented lighting. The ignorance of what's going on inside is directly related to the ability to charge $8000 for a fixture.

It all started with our video which taught people how to DIY their own fluorescent fixtures and continues on with articles in our blog where we've shown how simple it is to make an HMI or an HMI-like fixture out of an old fresnel and can even be done for under $500. We then proved it by coming out with a "CDM 150w Fresnel" significantly under $500. Who else has done that?

Other resources include our FAQ which covers many commonly asked questions about ballasts, fluorescent tubes or our forum where people can ask questions. We talk about the testing of fluorescent tubes, CRI, output and all that on our site. The Cool Lights video magazine which will be a place to cover specific topics and have commercials demonstrating things like the HMI's in use. There will be more installments in the future when I can get a moment.

And there will be other things to discover in the future as well that can be covered in the above forums, other parts of the site yet to be added or here on DVXUser where many of my postings become articles and education that don't always have to do with pushing our products. We even have long threads where people can contribute to design of new ideas. I'm not aware of all that many professional lighting companies that work like this today.
 
Well that's exactly the kind of response I asked for. Thanks Richard. Now I just need to find the cash, but you'll probably be hearing from me.
I like being told how to fix it myself and what the part numbers are - That's a response I'll save in my files for reference.

Any idea how to replace a fresnel for my old ultralite mini?
Its ever so slightly smaller than the ones Mole or Arri makes. I've wondered if i can buy the mole and have someone grind down an 1/8" all around.
I actually use the two broken pieces glued together with very visible epoxy right down the center, and it works surprisingly well - but its not perfect and has already broken twice.

- Lenny
 
As I understand it your fresnel lens broke on your mini mole and they don't make that size replacement part anymore. Yes you could grind another one down but thats a mess and probably costly too.

What is the exact size of the lens needing replacement? There's always the chance it can be found in other sources; for instance, we may be able to find that easily here in China.
 
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Richard,

Longtime lurker, first-time poster....I'm a DP who works with the HVX-200, HPX-500, and occasionally an assortment of Beta, Digibeta and HDCam gear. I shoot a variety of stuff, including music videos and commercials, but lately have been immersed in a documentary series project.

As you know, I've pre-ordered a lighting kit based on 1 x 455P, 1 x 255P, 1 x 300w tungsten fresnel, with stands, bulb cases and accessories. I've also ordered the big CCL-3 case, but now that the design has turned out to be non-checkable, I need to revisit what the best case(s) for me would be, considering I need a kit that can travel via plane.

I've emailed you about this...no reply yet. Since you've been very prompt and helpful in the past, I assume that maybe the email didn't get through to you this time...? Hopefully you'll see this post and can give me some information that will also benefit others..

In a nutshell, here is the question: is there a case (or an efficient configuration of two cases) that is checkable, that will accomodate (at minimum) 1x255P, 1x455P, 1x300w tungsten fresnel, three stands, 2x lollipop-to-stand adapters, and my two bulb cases (1x two-bulb and 1x four-bulb)? It appears that the CCL-1 won't fit everything, and the CCL-2 won't fit a 455P.

It appears from your post that the CCL-1 case could hold the 255P and 455P, and possibly both bulb cases (?), and two small stands (have you sourced some yet?) than I currently have on order. In this configuration the 300w wouldn't fit, correct? Nor would the third stand? What about the lollipop adapters?

So...if I decided to get two cases, would these be my options:

A. Buy a CCL-1 and a CCL-2, and stay with my taller stands...packing the taller stands in the CCL-2, along with my sticks and head (35" tall by 7 1/2" cross-section, <18 lbs) in the second compartment. In the CCL-1, instead of packing stands, I would add the 300w fresnel, the second bulb case if necessary, and some stingers and accessories. This seems like my preferred option, as I could stay with two checked bags for gear. It also seems like it might accomodate a few possible extras such as my Lowel DP 1K open face, a flex-fill, boom arm, extra stand, etc.

B. Buy two CCL-1's, subbing shorter stands for the tall ones. In case #1, pack the 455P and 255P, bulb case(s), lollipop adapters and as many stands as will fit (2 or 3). In case #2, pack the 300w fresnel, possibly the second bulb case and excess stand, stingers and accessories. This means i would still end up with a third checked bag, with my sticks....and I would be limited to the shorter light stands (or cram a couple of taller stands in the case with my sticks).

What do you think about these options? Am I missing anything?

One more question: I worked recently with a gaffer who loves to arm in a one-tube two-foot flo (generic, I think) as an interview backlight. The lamp he used has a bright shiny wraparound reflector, an a separate ballast that clamps to the light stand. Do you have such a product (or a DIY solution, as it seems like it was a pretty basic, generic unit)? Something like this would be a nice gag to add to my kit...

Thanks for your help, and I'm looking forward to being one of the first to own your portable Cool Lights!
 
Hi Mark,

Yeah, something's up with our emails. I received two emails and I answered 4 times but it's not getting through to you for some reason. Here's basically what I said in the last email:

Yes, its true, we had to change the size of Case 3 to be larger than what can be checked. When we put it on the site in a product page, we'll have in prominent display that it's an "around town bag only"' CL-CCL1 is probably the one for you, but its a Flo-only case.

I worked and worked and I can't come up with something that will fit both a CL-455P and one or more fresnels and still be checkable as luggage. I really wanted to but the length of the flo and the depth necessary for a fresnel are working against each other.

We do in fact have a stand now that will fit in the CL-CCL1 case and you can fit two in there even along with a CL-255P and a CL-455P and bulb cases. It takes care of your flo needs for what you bought.

Then, we just need to figure out how you can carry the 3rd stand and the fresnel. There again, the challenge is working with the very small fresnel which alone could be put in a really small case, but we have a third stand that needs to be accommodated somewhere which is 27" long. Sounds like what we really need is another bag that's about 28" long and has two or three small fresnel compartments. You can use the other compartments for other things you may need if you don't have other fresnels. Maybe I can just find an existing one in the market and offer that to you. Or maybe we need a CL-CCL4 case. I'm sure this issue will come up more often for those that are traveling a lot.
 
Richard,

Thanks for the reply. Based on my overall needs, that's why I was thinking maybe a CCL-2 as a second bag might work....I could fit my sticks in one side, then -- depending on whether the partitions are moveable on the other side, I could either tuck the third light stand with some accessories and the 300w fresnel on that side, or...

Get the taller stands after all, and put all three in the CCL-2, next to my sticks...then move the partitions in the CCL-1 to fit the 300w fresnel.

In truth, I'd love to be able to pack a fourth stand in one of the bags...for flags or flexfill, as well as a bit of space for a couple of stingers and other miscellaneous stuff.

Do you think this is feasible with a combination fo CCL-1 and CCL-2?

And, what do you recommend for a single-tube biax fixture? Is this best tackled as a DIY project? And would I have any chance at all of tucking it into one of these bags?
 
Yes thats a good combination you described but I still would like to revisit the idea of a CL-CCL4 at some point as a bit shorter bag for smaller fresnels and stands. I think you should be able to fit two small stands in the CCL1 and 2 larger stands in the CCL2 no problem.

On the idea of a single tube biax fixture I have thought of that before. Something like that with a DC ballast and battery would be a killer portable light. People are always saying how they love to tape single tubes to the wall or ceiling. Well, the single biax might even be better for that. Like a little wand with the battery and ballast in the base. I have seen a worklight before that used a biax tube. Had a plastic protective cover over the tube which is perfect. I'll see if I can dig that up again.
 
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