Lighting Kit User Experience
- Thread starter scotman
- Start date
PerroneFord
Deals in Lead
What is it you're trying to light? If you are looking for something to shoot interviews, you'd get a VERY different recommendations than trying to light outdoor scenes.
PerroneFord
Deals in Lead
Most of the tungsten lights I've seen allow you to change bulbs, and use adapters to plug in when you're in different countries.
For indoor lighting on the cheap (but not crap) I'd suggest looking at Coollights (they advertise here) or Lowel. I have not used the coollight product, but I am very impressed with what I have seen from their product line. I do have Lowel lighting and though it may not be as tough and solid as Mole Richardson or Arri lights, they are light for travel, and work just fine.
I suggest you spend some time learning about the different kinds of lights (open face, fresnel, flos, pars) as well as color temperature of the lighting and what that means.
I would say that you probably want to get at least 3 lights if you can afford it. One soft, two hard, all with gels to make them balanced to daylight. I'm sure others will be along to assist you.
For indoor lighting on the cheap (but not crap) I'd suggest looking at Coollights (they advertise here) or Lowel. I have not used the coollight product, but I am very impressed with what I have seen from their product line. I do have Lowel lighting and though it may not be as tough and solid as Mole Richardson or Arri lights, they are light for travel, and work just fine.
I suggest you spend some time learning about the different kinds of lights (open face, fresnel, flos, pars) as well as color temperature of the lighting and what that means.
I would say that you probably want to get at least 3 lights if you can afford it. One soft, two hard, all with gels to make them balanced to daylight. I'm sure others will be along to assist you.
Cool Lights
DVXuser Sponsor
Indoors is certainly easier and more economical to buy for than outdoors.
A lot of preliminary decisions should be made when deciding on your kit:
- hard and/or soft light sources (hard=tungsten or metal halide in open face or fresnel fixtures), soft = fluorescent bulbs in various configurations and tungsten or metal halide behind diffusion),
- cool or hot lights (fluorescent and metal halide for cool or traditional tungsten for hot lights--also coming down to traditional energy usage and air conditioning requirements or more economical and efficient in energy usage),
- portable or fixed (this comes down to setup time, weight and build usually as to how portable they are otherwise they may be more suited to leaving on a stand or the ceiling of your studio),
- daylight or tungsten (daylight is the choice of many who don't have a legacy of tungsten fixtures to blend in with or tungsten color to blend with other real tungsten 3200K fixtures), etc.
Hope this helps.
A lot of preliminary decisions should be made when deciding on your kit:
- hard and/or soft light sources (hard=tungsten or metal halide in open face or fresnel fixtures), soft = fluorescent bulbs in various configurations and tungsten or metal halide behind diffusion),
- cool or hot lights (fluorescent and metal halide for cool or traditional tungsten for hot lights--also coming down to traditional energy usage and air conditioning requirements or more economical and efficient in energy usage),
- portable or fixed (this comes down to setup time, weight and build usually as to how portable they are otherwise they may be more suited to leaving on a stand or the ceiling of your studio),
- daylight or tungsten (daylight is the choice of many who don't have a legacy of tungsten fixtures to blend in with or tungsten color to blend with other real tungsten 3200K fixtures), etc.
Hope this helps.
PerroneFord
Deals in Lead
I will make one comment concerning the post from Coollights:
Unfortunately, even those of us without a legacy of tungstens would be interested in daylight fixtures, except for the rather steep entry cost. My entire lighting kit cost me less than what a 1k HMI would have. I think until that changes, people on tighter budgets will continue to purchase tungsten fixtures and gel them as necessary.
Unfortunately, even those of us without a legacy of tungstens would be interested in daylight fixtures, except for the rather steep entry cost. My entire lighting kit cost me less than what a 1k HMI would have. I think until that changes, people on tighter budgets will continue to purchase tungsten fixtures and gel them as necessary.
Cool Lights
DVXuser Sponsor
Except that fluorescents come in both tungsten and daylight color and are available for quite a bit less than a 1K hmi as well.
Daylight fluorescents are not that expensive and quite commonly found nowadays from many sources.
Daylight fluorescents are not that expensive and quite commonly found nowadays from many sources.
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PerroneFord
Deals in Lead
True, but most Flos don't carry well. If you're lighting 5-10ft from the subject, then terrific. But if you're trying to light a living room, or a group of people, things get quite a lot more difficult. Flos also don't give you any option other than using them as a soft light, where a Fresnel or Par do give you the option.
I have a few CFL fixtures, including a softbox one and I am very pleased with them. But unless someone wants to step up to something like your 6x55, its going to be pretty tough getting that light to punch through. Controlling them is also quite a bit harder than a good daylight par or HMI Fresnel also.