Is there such a think as Decent LED rendering these days?

P

paulcurtis

Veteran
I'm not in a position to test every LED out there but all the ones i've seen so far has really poor colour rendering compared to, say, Kinos or HMIs. I do understand how LEDs work and i do know why there are huge problems.

I have a number of panels, from the 312AS to the 508 panels etc,. I understand that the vast majority of LED panels are using the same LEDs as well

What i don't know is whether there are any LED lights out there that are really workable in a mixed lighting situation. Whether anyone has really compared them side by side. The issue is not so much the colour cast but the complete lack of certain colours in their spectrum. Skin becomes very unhealthy.

Right now it seems that fixtures like the kino barfly are actually the better way to go, but they are quite a bit more expensive (over here in the UK at least). I'm surprised there aren't more like the barfly out there?

How does everyone else find these panels?

cheers
Paul
 
http://www.arri.com/lighting/lighting_emea/led_systems/caster_series/broadcaster/

http://kinoflo.com/Products Button/LED/Celeb 200 DMX/Celeb200_DMX.html


On the cheap end this company gets a lot of thumb ups: http://www.fvlighting.com/store/lighting.html?SID=7jjofsfsq1knvb5uvn4a4rvjs3
I have three R-300s as my "travel light" kit, color for sure isn`t as good as my Divas (or any tungsten fixture),
but price, portability and ease of use outweight "best possible quality" under certain circumstances.

I think many are waiting for the "next generation" right now, like remote phosphor LEDs or more affordable plasma lights.
 
Has anyone really reviewed the Celeb series? Compared it like for like with traditional Kinos?

And that arri light - not one that i've seen before, but so little information around.

I've seen the F&V stuff and was considering getting a 1x1 to see but as you say waiting for the next generation - but when. Hence the barfly as being the only compact soft source panel style light i'm aware of. There's a good article from Guy Holt about the nature of LEDs and i can't believe we use so many LEDS with such poor performance. Well, i know why we use them - convenience - but only if they were better...

thanks
Paul
 
Remote phosphor is where it's at. It takes almost all of the weaknesses of LED lighting, and reworks them to its advantage. Sp the only real remaining issue becomes the discontinuous spectrum that's inherent to LED technology.

But remote phosphor panels actually beat out both HMI and Fluorescent technology for colour reproduction and accuracy in TLCI tests.

All of which is to say, that the big advantage of remote phosphor units, is that they'll be spitting out good quality light for as long as you can keep them in one piece. Light quality that good can't really be made obsolete. So assuming their build quality lasts (and being tough and solid-state I think they will) they'll be 15-20 year lifecycle units, like your basic tungsten Blondes/redheads etc. they should last most of your career.

So although they're pricey, at least they're a safe, long-term investment.
 
I believe even remote phosphor is spectrally deficient in many areas as well, although better than straight LEDs. Of course i'm sure one day it will all catch up but colour rendering doesn't appear to be a major drive for the manufacturers. It could be that plasma is the one to watch for.

Has anyone side by sided a celeb and kino? Certainly the trucolor remote phosphor looks interesting but it's expensive compared to just normal lights. There's always that balance that tungsten is cheap as is fluro.

At the end of the day i need some small LED like panels that can be battery driven and output a quality of light that will not make people look ill.

The only thing i can see are Kino CFLs in the form factor of barfly lights - but i think they may be discontinued (looking at bh), i'm quite surprised that no one has made a fixture for the myriad of T5 and CFL bulbs out there... Mmmm...

cheers,
Paul
 
Remote Phosphor is extremely accurate, but a little weaker in the far red than traditional tungsten quartz.

ARRI L-series LED fixtures are very good and highly tunable.

Quantum Dot technology is extremely good as well. This is the LED source inside Mole's new fresnel lights.
 
Thanks Mitch,

I'd looked at spectral graphs of the cineo (?) and some generic ones, there's a blue spike and a fast dip in red which as you say means weaker in the tungsten range. The blue spike could be handled with filters (although perhaps more modern phosphors would filter that directly - perhaps that's a side effect of the driving LEDs)

Will look at Quantum Dot, if nothing else the technology term sounds very cool.

I guess these are all very expensive at the moment.

thanks
Paul
 
I very much like the light out of the hive lights, and that kickstarter project is very interesting - although not sure a hydroponics light is going to cut it on set. However perhaps there will be other versions? Unless hive have a lot of very tight patents. Or hive produce some reasonably priced versions.

The mole LED fresnels are nice but may as well buy a 1200w HMI for the same cost (not the same thing but as a comparison of costs)

cheers
Paul
 
How about Dracast lights? Claiming high CRIs but i've not found any samples showing this. Does anyone here know of them?

cheers
Paul
 
Spartacus said:
http://www.arri.com/lighting/lighting_emea/led_systems/caster_series/broadcaster/

http://kinoflo.com/Products Button/LED/Celeb 200 DMX/Celeb200_DMX.html


On the cheap end this company gets a lot of thumb ups: http://www.fvlighting.com/store/lighting.html?SID=7jjofsfsq1knvb5uvn4a4rvjs3
I have three R-300s as my "travel light" kit, color for sure isn`t as good as my Divas (or any tungsten fixture),
but price, portability and ease of use outweight "best possible quality" under certain circumstances.

I think many are waiting for the "next generation" right now, like remote phosphor LEDs or more affordable plasma lights.
Click to expand...

care to share any footage with the r300s at work?

thanks in advance.

be well.

rob
smalltalk productions/nyc
 
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