Kit Quandry!!!

M

maooley

Member
Hi all,

I just started doing video for an ad agency. I am shooting with an HVX200 and will likely shoot mostly in hi-def.

I am currently looking for a lighting kit... just a basic kit would suffice. Specifically, I will be lighting a (rather large) kitchen to shoot a DVD loop video for a cabinet company trade show.

Anyway... I have been looking on www.bhphotovideo.com at their kits. The stuff looks good, but i'm confused as what to get, as I really don't know much about lighting for video, only still.

My budget is about $1500 - $2K.

Please help!!!!

Thanks in advance!

–O
 
Hi,

I would put in my vote for fluorescent lighting. ;-)

Of course it all depends on the look you want. Fluorescent lighting is soft and flattering and is considered by many to go along with HD very well. In particular, shadows are softer. I doubt you would want a "hard" look (such as that given off by undiffused tungsten lighting) and HD has a way of showing off details that people may not even want to see--for instance the pores on a persons face or details in woodwork which might not look as good with hard and defined shadows. 2nd choice would be a conventional tungsten softbox which would give the same effects.

Both of these choices have a large surface area and will cover a great deal of the kitchen. There's always the possibility that you may need two units to cover everything though.

Good luck with your choice.
 
Any more specifics of what you're shooting? That can help get you more accurate advice. Are there going to be people in this kitchen? Or are you literally shooting cabinets?

In any case... I doubt that shooting kitchen cabinets is the only thing you bought the camera for, and there will future projects with that HVX of yours with different requirements.

If I were starting from scratch making a general-purpose lighting kit for ~$1500-ish right now, I'd go with one or two fluorescents, probably the dimmable ones from Flolight or maybe the Cool Lights ones (although I'll be more tempted once those have dimmers on them too). And then a couple fresnels, preferably used from a decent brand like Mole, LTM, Desisti. (I only don't say Arri b/c I think their stuff goes for too much used... if buying new they're certainly an option-- an option with very very very good resale value).

Round that out with stands, extension cords, some gels and diffusion materials, some black wrap, some grippy knick-knacks like scissor clamps and super-clamps... and voilá... you've blown far more than you ever intended. :)

Hope that helps.
-Kevin
 
Haha yea... I understand about "blowing" more than I ever intended. That equipment adds up waaay too fast.

As far as my shooting... Yes... there will indeed be future projects. However, I mention this kitchen project specifically because it is our first big project for a client. But, just for the record, yes... these lights will need to be multi-purpose and will be used for other future projects.

Shooting specifics that I know about the kitchen project... it will be a large open kitchen with no people. That's about all I know. There will probably be lighting fixtures in the kitchen that I will want to capture on my video – and thus not drown out by my lights. Also... color balancing is a major issue because our clients want the wood to look the way it actually looks.


I really don't know much about lighting for video. My background is in still photography and i'm just really getting in to my HVX200. Any tips or pointers on setup, color balancing, color temp, etc. would help out a great deal.

Thanks again for all your replies.

–mao
 
maooley said:
I really don't know much about lighting for video. My background is in still photography and i'm just really getting in to my HVX200. Any tips or pointers on setup, color balancing, color temp, etc. would help out a great deal.
Click to expand...

When will you be doing this project? You have a lot to learn to become an expert in a short time. It would be tough for us to know where to begin in educating you.

For instance, do you know the color temp of the fixtures there already in the room you're going to shoot? You should match that if those fixtures are going to be on. They could be anything from 2700K to 6400K and we can't guess. Will there be lots of windows in the room with daylight streaming in? There's another issue to take care of through gelling the windows, etc. This is a much bigger thing than you think to learn in such a short time.

Personally, as I said earlier I would avoid hard light and stick with softboxes or fluorescents and keep everything the same color temperature is good advice.

I'm not sure what you mean by "color balancing" -- are you refering to white balance? Well if you match all your fixtures to the existing ones and then white balance to the lighting in the room with a white card your cabinet wood should look normal.
 
The project is next month... April 18th, so I at least have a little time to learn what I can.

I don't know the color temp. of the fixtures and I really have no way of finding out before I get there. As far as windows, I have requested photos of the kitchen before I get there, as to know about windows, etc.


By "color balancing" yes, I mean "white balancing"... basically making the temps. of all lights sources the same and then balancing the camera to a white card, as you said.


Thanks for the advice. Every little bit helps. Any other tips are appreciated.

-mao
 
I've shot a lot of commercials, over a 1000, and many in these type enviroments.

Kitchen show rooms tend to be very difficult to light and maintain a natural look to the wood. Real wood cabinets, of that's what they are, tend to of material that are at extremes. Either very light grains that bounce light and glare all over or dark woods that absorb light. Also the stainless steel appliances create reflection problems of their own.

Keep your lights as soft as possible. As mentioned already fluoros are a good choice, soft boxes, umbrellas, scrims, silks what ever it takes to avoid hard direct light.

I have typically all ways tried to kill the existing lights and start lighting from scratch but that can take a while and quite a few lights.

My biggest advice, location scout, location, location scout. How many areas will you be shooting, where are the electrical outlets, where's their breaker box, will you be able to turn off that area where the displays are located.

my 2.7 cents.
 
Steve (and all) ... First of all, thanks for the replies.

I have found out a bit more about my shooting location... I got a (pretty terrible) picture of the kitchen I will be shooting. You can view it (and a few renderings of the kitchen) here:
http://www.mattooley.com/long_beach.jpg
http://www.mattooley.com/long_beach_2.jpg
http://www.mattooley.com/long_beach_3.jpg

As far as I can tell from the floor plans, there will be minimal daylight hitting the kitchen area. However, there will be some daylight. Would it make more sense to try to shoot the kitchen at night? The wood is cherry, so it will be very dark and probably absorb lots of light. As you can see from the photo, the lights appear to be halogen.

Any general lighting setup or production techniques are appreciated. Again, i'll be shooting HD with a Panasonic HVX200.

Thanks again,

Matt
 
Questions in regards to soft light...

Firstly, this is the kit i'm looking at: http://www.lowel.com/tota/tota_h.html#info
(i'm going with halogen due to compactness and lightweight/ease of travel.)

So... My question is... Is there a huge difference in "softness" or intensity of light between a soft box and a reflective umbrella? Would one option trump the other? If so, how much?
 
Softboxes are just a bit softer than umbrellas... unless you're shooting through a white one in which case it's about the same... except that the softbox will give you much better projection/light-output b/c it's reflecting more of the light in the right direction instead of every which way.

The softest of soft will be blasting any-ol' light into a white ceiling, which lights like Tota's are handy for. Think total-lack-of-control, but nice even base light level. Although bouncing like that is pretty darn inefficient, so a 750w Tota bounced in a room like that only brings you up to "medium-dim"...nice scientific terminology there, eh? :)

The Lowel Rifa softboxes are great-- they're as good as any tungsten softbox. But they're also not cheap, and given the benefits of fluorescents, I think it's wiser to buy the latter. No they're not as compact or light, but they win on all the other points. (Such as having both daylight and tungsten-balanced bulbs available, which could be super handy if you were... say... shooting a kitchen where lots of daylight may or may not be streaming in.)

-Kevin
 
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