Led Lights

Yeah, that would be nice. I would love to go to NAB next year I just don't know it its in the budget yet considering all the other projects I have. Haven't seen you around here much lately Kevin--you must have some projects of your own going on right now...
 
Yeah some good things in the works-- that hopefully will lead to a life in which I actually make a living from what I love (storytelling), as opposed to the miscellaneous crappolla that pays the bills at present. I have my fingers crossed that it'll all work out. If it does, you'll most likely be receiving a sizeable order from me. :)

Sadly, I have some of your stupendously priced competitor's/predecessor's products in my arsenal now-- I couldn't wait for the portables/light weight fixtures to come out. But your collection looks like it's just right-- great variety of stuff. Even the LED stuff on the horizon.... although nothing like the Zylight? ;)

And I think that the users of DVXuser are the benefactors of your boredom in China when you're not working.... b/c seriously you write the most articulate and helpful answers to everyone in the lighting section.... even when it's just a broad question and you're not pimping your own products. Always good stuff. That's why you' haven't seen much of me; b/c you always beat me to responding to threads much more knowledgeably than I ever could. :) I think you're going to kick major ^%$# with these new products.

-Kevin

P.S. Go to Shanghai and watch the Formula 1 race tomorrow!
 
Wow. Thanks for the kind words. I hope what you're working on works out. Anytime you can get away from working for other people/by the hour/etc. it's a good thing. Living off your own ideas and creativity is the way it should be and is the ultimate freedom from having to give away the creativity to others for money.

Shanghai is a great city to visit. Wish I could get away but I'm really busy right now getting all this stuff finished. Like they say, it's the last 10% that's killer on any project.

On the subject of LEDs, I really have some good ideas there but I was sort of saving that for later because they're still at such a price point that it places them in a kind of high end and specialty use category. Also, in the meantime hoping for some more affordable advances in output vs. energy drawn, etc. We'll see. Next year should be another good year for LEDs and different models coming out. I'll be going to the Hong Kong lighting fair at the end of this month and there's usually something interesting to be found there as all the fluorescent tube, metal halide bulb, tungsten bulb and LED folks from all around Asia come there. Not as interesting as racing in Shanghai but not a bad time either for those interested in lighting technology.
 
Not sure where you get that idea. Maybe if you're from another country, but not in the USA and probably not in Europe either. For instance, in pro fixtures, my Cool Lights units are completely silent and flicker free it's getting harder and harder (at least in the USA) to find a noisy new fixture--I think you'd have to try to find one actually. Particularly in the pro fixtures there's not going to be any noise unless its a pretty unsophisticated model. If you're talking about old timey magnetic ballasts perhaps in some old household or office environments but I've only heard a noisy CFL either when it was malfunctioning or it was the worst of the worst.
 
Either. It's not a good idea to transport the tubes in the fixture over any long distance and especially not in any kind of air travel or where its not you handling the bags during the entire process. Our foam lined bulb case will make sure the bulbs make the trip intact. So, you use them for the primary set of tubes that go in the fixture, but no reason not to have a second case to carry another color temperature of bulbs in case you need to change out to match existing lighting in an location.
 
Richard's new line of lights seem really great and I like reading about them and finding out more information, but there are already at least two other threads about these great products.

This thread was started to talk about the LED lights and the new LED bank sold by FloLight. I would love to hear more about Richard's LED plans here since this is about LED so can we stick to the LED concept in this thread?

Richard made some interesting observations about the FloLight claims about how much light they put out when only 40 watts and questioned why they did not have DC capability.

I found his comments compelling and I certainly respect his research and knowledge. So I'd really like somebody to buy one of these and invite me over:)

As a coincidence, I got the latest Videography magazine in the mail yesterday and FloLight has an ad with the 500 LED Light.

The points in the add are:

*500 Bright 5600K Led's
*500w of Light
*Draws Just 40W
*Dimmable
*Run On AC or 12v DC

When you go to the website there is no mention of the 12v DC ability (which was one of the things Richard thought was an odd feature to not have, and I agree with him).

The light has 4 switches to turn off banks of the lights so I guess this is what they mean when they say dimmable.

Would the Harbor Freight router speed control that many of us have work as a dimmer on these?

I have seen in the past that FloLight ran an ad and the actual product was slightly different. Maybe because of printing they have to place the ad when the product is not finalized.

Anyway, would love to see what the real product looks like and how it really works. Would also like to see Richard put out one of these with the great quality he puts into all his lights.
 
Hi Kelly,

Dimming LEDs is easy, but it requires a special circuit like a motor speed controller. However, here's why the Harbor Freight motor speed controller one WOULD NOT work and shouldn't even be tried. The motor speed controller circuit is like what I used on my panel. (Since there is some doubt about what this Flolights thing draws: 12vDC or 110vAC--that really needs to be confirmed by someone before much can be done. If its 110v you can't dim it at all with more explanation below why you can't). By the way, it really is a terrible idea for future flexibility to come out with any 110v LED solution. If you provide a 12v solution you leave so much room for other flexible addons like dimmers or batteries. But that's another story. Anyway...

The Harbor Freight motor speed controller is fabulous for normal tungsten 110v lighting. This is because a motor speed controller provides just what you need to dim lighting in the best way possible. Some feel its even better than a variac (variable transformer) which is the other way to accomplish it. I won't go into why this is the case right now. Let's just assume for the moment that it's true.

The Flolights (and any LED running off 110v) are not directly drawing the 110v to light them. They go through an internal (hidden) power supply which converts the 110v to 12vDC (or 24v if the LEDs require that). If you tried to dim the Flolights or any 110v input LED at their AC voltage input using the harbor "dimmer" you would very probably damage the power supply of the LED unit.

If, on the other hand the light uses a direct 12VDC input with a "wall wart" power supply, dimming could still be accomplished by inserting a 12VDC equivalent of the Harbor Freight motor speed controller circuit in between the LEDs and the power supply. So the path would be 110v to 12VDC power supply to 12VDC motor speed controller to LED unit. No other power coming to the LED unit other than the output of the 12VDC motor speed controller. That's what my product does and it seems to be the best and most flexible way to accomplish dimming with LEDs.

To call bank select dimming is really disingenuous. Can you imagine how mad people would be if they ordered one of these and saw it had a bunch of switches instead of a dimmer dial?
 
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Richard, you are a "know it all" and I mean that in a good way, not the way we used to mean it when we thought somebody was a blow hard. You are really are a GREAT know it all.

I'm not certain I completely understand because it is a little above my brain power in this area. But what I got form that answer was "NO".

The other scenarios contained several "ifs" which don't appear to be the case in the current situation with the FloLight.

The obvious answer to all of this is to just clone yourself so you two can make all these products that we are dreaming about.
 
Thanks for the compliments! Yeah, its a real problem of manpower and time. As one of my old bosses used to say "it's no problem, just bring money" when asked if something was possible in a certain time frame. If I add more staff, then prices go up. If I throw more money at our manufacturing partners to get them to hurry up, the price goes up. If I find something off the shelf that works great as is, but the price is not so great--well you get the point.

We just need to sort of get to some critical mass area where volume of sales goes up with what we have now then we can add more implementation capacity with the increased profit, so-to-speak. Said, a different way: with the underpinnings of my business plan it's a question of getting our profit though volume and not by raising prices.

I checked with "Tina" the sales clerk at the Chinese company that makes these units this morning (its 8:39am here in China on Monday morning as I write this by the way if anyone cares). The unit actually does have a 12vdc input and uses an external power supply wall wart type of deal. So that's not as bad as I thought. All you need to do in this case is build a 12VDC motor speed controller, put it in a nice little black box to protect it, etc. You should also be able to power a panel like this then with a tekkeon battery or some such DIY solution. At 40w draw though, the battery won't last long! I still say that $399 is pretty pricey though for something that doesn't even have a battery or dimmer built in.

You see, this is the problem with just carrying solutions manufactured by someone else and why I don't do it so often. Another reason I rejected this panel because its made by another company. You end up just being a middle man that tacks on some extra money for a profit. It's one reason I live over here and try to manufacture stuff through OEM factories so I can keep from just becoming a middle man with no added value. Occasionally, I find a hidden gem like the Sportlight 575w Par which is made by another manufacturer but has little chance of making its way outside of China because its off the beaten track. In those cases, I may carry it but it will be higher than if I made it myself. Even then though I find myself specifying changes which delay it from being offered. It's hard to please people (or at least me) with off-the-shelf stuff IMHO.

Anyway, if I were doing a panel like this (and I will be as you saw before) I would hope to sell the panel for $199 with dimming and then have battery options that add a bit more on top of that. Yes its possible. The variable I don't have yet though is exactly what the fixture case / barndoors are going to cost me. That's the goal for the price range but could change based on the fixture housing and how reasonably I can make it. We don't always arrive at the all the exact parameters of the goal but we usually do obtain the goal for the most part.

Ideally, the fixture housing will be a miniature version of the new plastic flo product, using the same type lightweight plastic and same fittings, barndoor ideas. I love that design and I think it would work well in miniature too.

A further area of study is the mounting on the back. The lollipop is overkill for something so small and too big and heavy for it, so I was thinking maybe something like a gooseneck fitting down to a baby 5/8" stand adapter might make the most sense. I don't see this so much as an on-camera light as more something like a beside camera light although the weight will be very light I think.

I'd say Vidled and Zylight have the best ideas for on-camera lighting -- something smaller. I think of this as more of a portable fill/spotlight, like for use in lighting people in a car or shooting an interview in the middle of the desert at night, etc. It isn't a replacement for larger flo, tungsten or HMI units yet though. And at 25w draw, its still possible to find a reasonable battery solution (I hope).
 
Cool Lights said:
We just need to sort of get to some critical mass area where volume of sales goes up with what we have now then we can add more implementation capacity with the increased profit, so-to-speak. Said, a different way: with the underpinnings of my business plan it's a question of getting our profit though volume and not by raising prices.
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There it is people. A dollar spent is a dollar saved. Start spending!

(No sarcasm intended...I'm ordering flo, but wanting portable, powerful led, bigtime)
 
Hi Steve,

Consider a dollar spent in Cool Lights as buying stock in a company that will keep delivering more interesting stuff in the future. Your dividends come out as increasing new developments and maintaining lower prices (as much as possible) in the face of the shrinking dollar, the cost of commodities like metals going up, the loss of some of the Chinese government's tax incentives to factories to keep prices of export goods low (thanks to the U.S. government for that pressure by the way), etc. In some ways, its a little like a Coop, but we're not quite a Coop because I hope to make a profit at some point and actually draw a salary (wow what a concept).

Here's a KEY POINT to consider. Whereas most suppliers or investors view it as: you need to wait for a market to form before you invest in products for that market--its just too risky to move without lots of market research; I believe that you should invest first and create the market that doesn't exist yet rather than sitting around waiting for it to form.

The feeling (by most existing manufacturers) has been that the market for professional lighting and associated equipment is just not that large. Perhaps it's true and this justifies a higher price. My feeling though is that if you make the first step of offering the lower priced product that a larger market will be created solely by this availability. If I had more money to invest we'd have more product and available sooner. One proof of this theory: the availability of more inexpensive cameras created a larger market than existed before -- why would this not be the case with lighting and all the other production equipment necessary to do things correctly?

It's just me investing so far partly because I'm pretty independent and also partly because if you add more people you lose some control and the vision might get diluted too. I've had lots of offers but we'd give up most of our ownership and independence so we've passed so far. Also, it's darn hard to find people that don't think what I'm doing is pretty risky anyway. Living in China, international trade and shipping, etc. It's hard to even get a life insurance policy if you tell them you've even traveled to Asia let alone living there on a daily basis ;-)
 
What will the the equivilent output of your leds look like in if they were fluos?

Are there any plans to release something like dedolights? I played around with them the day before yesterday and fell in love. They are very pricey though.
 
Did I miss a thread on carrying cases ? Anything yet? In the works, or not offered yet, not an option ? Other manufactures cases you would recommend ???
Thanks Richard..
 
filmat11 said:
Did I miss a thread on carrying cases ? Anything yet? In the works, or not offered yet, not an option ? Other manufactures cases you would recommend ???
Thanks Richard..
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Yes, we didn't talk much about the case options here but it would have been nice to have had a thread about that. I brought it up a couple of times but didn't get that many comments.

I have three cases designed and in progress right now but I may leave them out of this shipment if they continue to hold things up. Suitcase/bag factories are really busy here now and they quote long lead times. My 3 cases are all soft cordura black nylon types with a hard inner layer and soft padded interior with removable velcro'd separating partitions and dimensions as follows:

1). 41" long x 19" wide x 16" deep. Has wheels and a handle on top. Due to height, not necessary to have a pull-up trolley. Has removable velcro separators that can customize compartment sizes. Can accomodate 1 4x55P, 1 2x55P, 1 6 bulb carrying case, 1 1000w or smaller fresnel, stand adapters, lollipops and 3 stands. Has accessory pocket in lid for eggcrates. Intro price $225.

2). 41" long x 14" wide x 12" deep. Has wheels and a handle on the top. Due to height, not necessary to have a pull-up trolley. Also has velcro partitions. Can accomodate 1 2x55P, 1 bulb case, 3 stands and 1 650w fresnel or smaller in one scenario. Another scenario is 3 650w fresnels and 3 stands. Has accessory pocket in lid for eggcrates. Intro price $195

3). 34" long x 22" wide x 14" deep. Has wheels and a pullup trolley. Has one velcro partition. 2 scenarios: 1 4x55P and 1 2x55P and bulb cases or 1 6x55p and bulb case. Could accomodate 2 stands but they'd have to be very short when folded up but still strong enough to hold up the (up to 12lbs) fixtures. Has accessory pocket for eggcrates. Intro price $135.
 
muroshi said:
What will the the equivilent output of your leds look like in if they were fluos?

Are there any plans to release something like dedolights? I played around with them the day before yesterday and fell in love. They are very pricey though.
Click to expand...

The Lumen per watt values of the LEDs used make it roughly the equivalent of a 55w fluorescent unit watt per watt. Since my panel only draws 25w and a 2x55 is 110w this is roughly the equivalent of 1/4 of a 2x55. Even at my price of $199 which would be insanely low for such a panel, the price performance ratio of LEDs only makes sense in those applications where you just have to have an LED panel due to power restrictions, size restrictions, etc. As I said before LED use, IMHO, is restricted to very special uses for now until the price comes down and the lumen per watt values go up.

On the dedolight, it's for sure that's another sacred cow that could be looked at at some point. I have some ideas there but not much time to work on it for now. Spartacus, another dvxuser, was really interested in an open face 150w CDM unit that could work in a softbox and would be something like a tota type. So it would give you the equivalent of a 650w tungsten softbox. Fluorescent is probably best to use though for your soft lights, much less heat at the bulb level than metal halide.
 
Thank you for the clarification. Honestly, LED is a no go for my application then for now. Maybe only for table top, but there are cheaper ways to go.

Dedolights are surely overpriced and would have a big market. Everyone who worked with them loves them. But I guess they hold some tricky patents.
 
Just a quick question:
Can Coollights be used for still photography as well as video? I guess it seems a dumb question, but as long as the lights are daylight balanced it wouldn't be a problem setting white balance and getting the right colors right?
The reason I ask is because I want to build a continuous lighting system that can have a variety of uses. I want to do portraiture with a mix of lights and strobes (I already have the strobes) plus product photography plus video projects.
I wonder if there is a beginners setup of coollights (like a starter pack) for newbs lie me?
 
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