new lighting kit

Steve Laramie

Steve Laramie

Veteran
I am looking to add allot of lights to my current small lighting kit. Not sure what I need. I am buying from www.rostronics.com. Im sure they arent as good as lowells or arris but as long as they give off as much light they say they do im happy. I am a DP and find myself shooting anything from interviews to features. I usually dont supply the lights since thats the grips job but I think it will be easier to find work if I can double as a grip and dp. Here is my current setup.
2x lowel tolta lights 500watts each
1x lowel VIP light 150watt.
A bunch of frames gells and 3 6.5ft stands.

What else should I have? I plan on buying 3 1k's with softboxes and 2 6.5ft light stands and a boom stand.

I should also mention that I plan on getting a redrock adapter for my HVX200a so I will deffinetly need allot of light.
 
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INVEST IN GOOD FRESNELS. If your shooting everything you mention above, you'll benefit from focusable lights. Everything you own seems to be an open face light that can really only be controlled by diffusion or bouncing.
You will need some "Fire power" with the lens adapter your saving for, and a 1k with softbox is a good choice, but you'll also want to edge your subjects (where motivated) with some harder lights, and need some "throw" of a light that can be spotted or flooded out.
I encourage you to save your pennies for anything other than a Rostronic kit. They are cheaply made, and the bulbs are notorious for blowing far before their expected lifetime, and they will not be a good investment. They may work fine for a year, with very delicate handling, but you'll never see these lights on a grip truck ANYWHERE, unless the gaffer bought them from somebody from DVXUSER for 20 bucks because they kept falling apart, and he wanted a few extra background lights.
Save your pennies for a good ARRI or MOLE kit....Like the Softbank IV kit....check out B&H for this arri kit or the Mole equivalent.

ADDED: I'm not trying to be a light snob. I too started with a kit like yours 25 years ago. You will learn alot about light using the fixtures that you currently have. (Mostly that you can't believe that you lived without fresnels until you got your first one..lol) Learning how to modifiy, gell correctly,scrim,block,hide, flag,using a cookie, bouncing off different surfaces and colors, dimming, using black wrap and/or the bardoors, and what types of diffusion will give you the best results for faces, lighting up room, and even cutting holes in your diffusion for different patterns of hot and diffuse light.
You definately need some additional lights, please beg, borrow, rent some fresnels for your next project, and see the difference they will make before you just buy bigger versions of what you already own.
 
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check out coollights.biz for some pretty good fresnels. they aren't arri or mole quality, but they are nice and will last a good while. and the best usage for those totas is putting them in a softbox. get either a photoflex or chimera setup for those things(size small or medium). and maybe get a snoot for that vip light.
 
And watch ebay for lights. You can get some great deals. I've been lucking into some great Desisti fresnels. Picked up 3 650's with barndoors for 200 a piece and 2 1k's (no barndoors) for 130 and 150. The 650's needed a little cleaning up and the 1k's just needed some tvmp adapters as they had been on a pipe grid their whole lives. Perfect working order. Now I just need to find me some 200's or 300's and I'll be set for a while. There's lots of Mole stuff on there too, you just have to keep an eye out for it all and shop smartly.
 
rostronics has 1k focusable and 300w focusables
i have those and
aslo rostrinonics has a 600w/1200 switchable flood which is nice, and I also have that.
 
Yeah the 1k's I am thinking of getting have a dimmer from I think 300watt-1k and I think they are also focusable. My VIP lowel is focusable but its only a 150watt. I have used arris on a few sets and absolutely love them. I just dont plan on using lights allot. By allot I meen 75% of the time the grip has provided the lights. A few times ill get sucked into a super indie project and have to use my lights because they insist on using there home depot lights. Jack how long have you had your rostronic lights and do you notice anything that could indicate there incredible prices?
 
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