Going back to Tungsten, anyone experienced similar feelings?

MattRobertson

MattRobertson

Well-known member
I have lit things with all sorts of lighting, but for whatever reason, I keep coming back to tungsten eventually... Yes, I hate the heat of tungsten, yes its way less efficient, yes its harder to mix with sunlight, but there is such a quality about it that I just cannot replicate with other sources. Can be diffused to beautifully and can create nice sharp defined edges when you need it to. Honestly, it is not any less portable than most other sources as well. I was able to light a scene beautifully the other day with a 650w tungsten, two lowel pro lights, and a diffusion screen. All of those lights fit in my portabrace, in contrast to my flourescent lighting which only 1 of those will fit in my bag.

Just curious if anyone else has sort of toured the options lighting-wise and eventually came back to tungsten. I just find it to be such a flattering beautiful type of light.
 
If it burns, it's beautiful. or something like that....

high end CFLs and LEDs have gotten good, but the majority of what's out there is not high end. even HMIs can have terrible bulbs, maybe you should look into some of the smaller jokers, they're pretty darn respected as a quality light source
 
With the sensitivity of modern cameras, one can do a heck of a lot of damn fine work with a few Pro-lights and modifiers.
 
mcbob said:
With the sensitivity of modern cameras, one can do a heck of a lot of damn fine work with a few Pro-lights and modifiers.
Click to expand...

love the pro lights, i recently picked up the 12v dimmable ID light and grabbed a generic 12v 100w ac power supply off of ebay, all for around $130, and that little guy can pack a good punch! i've been meaning to pick up one of the regular pro lights along with a cord dimmer as well

you can certainly make a great little kit out of them, low cost, high quality, not tooo much heat.
 
I LOVE my pro-light, so glad I bought it. I also have a Lowel Omni with speedring and photoflex softboxes. I looooove my kit. Gonna add a Lowel Tota to complete the trifecta (to replace the scoop-with-umbrella I now use for fill). Im not that advanced with lighting but when I do become a badass master moviemaker my advice to beginners will be to suck it up and BUY LIGHTS, Ive never regretted it.
 
Last edited:
Why limit your kit to one type of lampI, I always say, the price of lighting is so low these days, there's no sense in only having tungsten, I think it's wise to have a three point kit of each, to be used alone, or mix matched, plus I would add a few practices in there, light bars are a must, alright it's easy for me to get carried away when it comes to lighting. I love to shape light.
 
It depends a lot on what Tungsten you're using - Redheads and Blondies are generally coarse and I dislike using them, but Arri Fresnels are a different story!

However, I'm tending more and more away from Tungsten; for studio-only work they're fine, but for location work I'm starting to use HMIs, and coupled with kino flow/flo lights, they're great, much cooler and much less power (always good!). I've used the new Arri L7 LED Fresnel, great light, but still very large and not much output@Tungsten colour temp, but I'm sure LED's will just get better and better.

Only "hot" light I'm using atm are Dedos, which are not much bother as they're so small.

But I agree that it's good to have a variety of lights to choose from :)
 
Tungsten is a ... how to say this ... it's an "honest" light. It's got a nice wide spectrum. Fluorescents and LEDs have gaps in their spectrum that tungsten just doesn't have.

Tungsten is primitive, and it's terribly hot and inefficient, but the fixtures are cheap and the light quality is good.

Actually, with more sensitive cameras becoming the norm, tungsten becomes a more viable option too; you don't need a 2K tungsten fixture as your key light anymore, which means you don't need a 1k for a fill, etc... now you can get by with a 650 for your key and a 300w for your fill, so that drops the heat and power draw down proportionally to something that's manageable.

As Hutchman points out, the quality of light can vary quite a bit based on the lens that's in front of it, an open-face light is going to be nowhere near as flattering as a properly-ground Fresnel lens, but that's not really a tungsten issue, that's more of a hard light issue.
 
mcbob said:
With the sensitivity of modern cameras, one can do a heck of a lot of damn fine work with a few Pro-lights and modifiers.
Click to expand...
I freaking love pro lights. Those are the most useful lights in any kit. I've done so much with just a few pro lights. Anyone should have 2-3 in their kit.
 
maranfilms said:
Why limit your kit to one type of lampI, I always say, the price of lighting is so low these days, there's no sense in only having tungsten, I think it's wise to have a three point kit of each, to be used alone, or mix matched, plus I would add a few practices in there, light bars are a must, alright it's easy for me to get carried away when it comes to lighting. I love to shape light.
Click to expand...
Oh trust me I have a wide variety of lights. I've got tungsten open faced lights, fresnels, softboxes, flourescent banks, some LED's, a CDM, etc. I still light with daylight when its absolutely nessecary, but I was just lamenting in this thread how I so often miss the look of Tungsten. Just coming to realize that there is something very special about the way it shows up on video that is very tough to replicate.
 
Skin tone looks better with tungsten then any other source, except when the talent starts to cook...

Fluorescent can look great if you use the right ones.

LEDs, are the devils light and should be binned. Don't believe the hype.
 
Barry_Green said:
Tungsten is a ... how to say this ... it's an "honest" light. It's got a nice wide spectrum. Fluorescents and LEDs have gaps in their spectrum that tungsten just doesn't have.
Click to expand...

I love that about tungsten units. Ive been shooting Fluoro a lot, but sometimes like to start a key with a touch of tungsten in it up front, before I get correct measurement with a fluoro unit. i.e. 300W tungsten with FULL CTB, then wash a my other light to choice over that. Just seems a little nicer than straight fluoro to me. I know it seems redundant to be using multiple sources to do the same job, but I like it.
 
Noel Evans said:
I love that about tungsten units. Ive been shooting Fluoro a lot, but sometimes like to start a key with a touch of tungsten in it up front, before I get correct measurement with a fluoro unit. i.e. 300W tungsten with FULL CTB, then wash a my other light to choice over that. Just seems a little nicer than straight fluoro to me. I know it seems redundant to be using multiple sources to do the same job, but I like it.
Click to expand...
I mix quite often. I don't think its that bad of a thing to do, especially when the circumstances call for it. I've become weary of using lots of tugsten wattage inside houses after multiple times setting off fire alarms from the heat... And I live in washington! Can't imagine the heat somewhere in the south using lots of tungsten fixtures.
 
Seems to me that Tungsten is getting less popular, hot lights of any sense are less popular. Which is a good thing in my opinion, means really cheep, good quality lights are available.

I recently swapped a day hire of my hvx202 for 2 arri bloodies! With several spare bulbs.
Got 3 inero redhead with HEAPS of spare bulbs for $50 with a fantastic case.
And!! And I got 3 pro lights, 2 omnis, 3 totas and a rifa ex55 with all stands, case, bulbs, and all sorts of extras for $300

Ive been picking up all sorts of cheap deals lately as no one seems to like using hot lights. I love em, Totas are my go to light.
 
My old Smith Victors (from the 1970S ) are tungsten. 1,800 watt lights. may have to dig those old hot lights out after reading this thread.
 
Last edited:
I don't think I could live in a world without Dedos.

Tungsten is nice, and easy, and kinder to skin than almost any other light out there. But everything has it's place. I love Dedos for very different reasons to my love for Kinos, and that's different again from what I enjoy about battery-powered LEDs, and then there's ye-old-faithful-run-it-on-just-about-anything 1.2k HMIs, which allow me to do things none of the other lights can do. All of these lights serve different purposes, the tricky part is understand just how to make the most of each of them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top