New to Lighting -- LED or Redheads???

C

crot0019

Well-known member
Hey guys I am new to lighting but not new to movies. An upcoming film of mine has prompted me and my production company to invest in a lighting kit (finally). The first film I am shooting is going to be quite dark -- mainly a bedroom at night-time. I am much more inclined visually toward the white colour-toned lights rather than the gold/yellow lights.

In doing some research I have narrowed the choice down to an LED kit like this one;

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/3375W-Photog..._Photographic_Accessories&hash=item35af3b0229


Or a Redhead kit like this;

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/NEW-2400W-St..._Photographic_Accessories&hash=item2c57784184

Although this particular project is the driving force behind me getting the kit. I will be using the kit many times in the future and my visual preference for white colour-tone will not change. Which is the best sort of kit to get??

Appreciate any feedback.
Thanks a lot.
 
First one is not LED, it is fluos kit.
And do not buy either one. Both are not good.
RedHead is cheap chinese stuff, usable, but hot, bulky and quality is not that good.
Fluos are also not handy, as they need very careful packing and are very indirectional.

I suggest 3x600 LED panels or may be 300 LED + 600 LED + 1200 LED.
All of them are available on ebay, search.
 
I have the redhead kit. I bought mine for $150 though and they've worked great. The color sux but you can ctb (color temp blue) or whitebalance most out.
 
On a low budget I would not recommend LED, period. The cheap fixtures are likely to have funky color temperature, low CRI (which will cause a green cast on camera) and terrible build quality; you really have to spend some serious $$$ to get decent LED gear and even then there's compromises. Color temperature in general isn't a big deal; if you want to get the "white light" look and all your fixtures are the same color temp, just white balance in camera. If you're new, start with tungsten fixtures as they are relatively cheap and are used on almost every film set. Redhead are open face tungsten fixtures, meaning that they don't have a focusing lens, so in general they're not as useful as a true fresnel design and why they're so much cheaper. There's some very good budget brand such as Cool Lights and JieTu (on ebay). They'll still be more expensive than those kits that you linked and there's no stands included, but at least they won't fall apart on you after a few weeks of use. If you really can't afford them right now Britek (rostronics.com) is an ok choice, although they are a VERY budget brand and their lights won't take much abuse.
 
You are lazy :-)

600 LED

http://cgi.ebay.com/600HP-LED-Video...095?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a0955b44f

1200 LED

http://cgi.ebay.com/1200H-LED-Video...072?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item27b41e2d30

312 LED light
http://cgi.ebay.com/312-LED-Lightin...308?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c18a92bf4
or variable temperature (they have much better CRI also)
http://cgi.ebay.com/LED-Light-Camer...293?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4155cedfbd

Read all this articles - http://www.coollights.biz/wordpress/archives/category/articles

From all initial novice solutions, I strongly suggest LED option.
It is good quality, portable, cool and with very big light throw.
Again, all this Chinese LEDs are of very good quality.
 
Crot0019,
I had heard that Australia's electrical compliance rules were pretty strict. If that's the case, you may end up having to pay extra to bring some of the asian products up to compliance. You may want to look into it a bit.


As far as CRI and colour temperature consistency is concerned, you can't go wrong with products like Kino Flo or Litepanels or any of the major lines. They will cost you more, but they are well worth it.

Here are some that I am comfortable recommending:

http://www.kinoflo.com/Lighting Fixtures/Diva-Lite/Diva-Lite.htm

http://www.litepanels.com/lp/products/onebyone_line.html

If you want a high CRI controllable Tungsten for accents, you can try:

http://www.dedolight.com/www/dedolight/default.php?la=0&pg=00000400030103&id=DLHM4-300&section=0

Ken


crot0019 said:
Hey guys I am new to lighting but not new to movies. An upcoming film of mine has prompted me and my production company to invest in a lighting kit (finally). The first film I am shooting is going to be quite dark -- mainly a bedroom at night-time. I am much more inclined visually toward the white colour-toned lights rather than the gold/yellow lights.

In doing some research I have narrowed the choice down to an LED kit like this one;

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/3375W-Photog..._Photographic_Accessories&hash=item35af3b0229


Or a Redhead kit like this;

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/NEW-2400W-St..._Photographic_Accessories&hash=item2c57784184

Although this particular project is the driving force behind me getting the kit. I will be using the kit many times in the future and my visual preference for white colour-tone will not change. Which is the best sort of kit to get??

Appreciate any feedback.
Thanks a lot.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks a lot for pointing that out Ken T and I love your links too. More expensive than I wanted to pay but it really seems worth the investment :)
 
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