Portable lighting kit

Efexone

Efexone

Well-known member
I currently use a set of Arri lights (1k, 2x 650's, 300) to light my interview setups - Everything is housed in a heavy, cumbersome Arri flight case that I'm starting to really hate dealing with. That said, what options do I have regarding a lighting kit consisting of 3-4 lights, at least one of them being able to put out a lot of power as a diffused key? Ultimately, It should be able to fit in a 1610 pelican.
 
i have a small lowell pro 250 kit that is usually more than adequate for head+shoulders interview.
 
A lot of people hate those Lowel light kits, but I used one for years with some black wrap, gels, and a handful of clips to shape light as needed and never had any issue. Yes, they're relatively cheap in build and don't look as 'pro' as having a large kit of Arri fresnels, but they do a damn good job of basic head/shoulders/interview shots if you know how to use them. Buy some extra bulbs though, I've had several instances of bulbs burning out during setup.

Adam
 
I am not a very big fan of the Lowels for anything more than interview stuff, for the build quality and light leaks sometimes bites you.

That being said, a Rifa is a great interview key. very pretty soft light.
 
Medium Arri case WITH wheels filled with Lowel lights (2x 1k, 2x500w, 2x 250, 1x rifa) + stands +some gripology is your way to go.

Problem with Pelican 1610 is that you really don't have space for any sizable stands so mounting lights on collapsible booms might be a problem.
 
but I used one for years with some black wrap, gels, and a handful of clips to shape light as needed and never had any issue.
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that should pretty much be said for any type / brand of lights.

im sure a lot of the lowel debate depends on personal experience. but i rented this kit quite often in my early days and eventually bought my small kit from off-rental from the same rental shop. and the ONLY issue ive had EVER is a blown bulb. and i think thats been like 3 times in well over a decade. and i can say the same or more from y use of arris, kino and a variety of other brands.
 
We have a lowel DP kit, brand new in box (we seldom use it) with 2 omni's, 2 floods, stands, and all the other stuff that comes with em - the problem is I find they run very very hot and are pain to light with due to having to manipulate them heavily before they produce the type of light I'd like. For a 1610 pelican, I was thinking more along the lines of an LED solution, tho even a 2 light kit is pricy at best.
 
Efexone said:
We have a lowel DP kit, brand new in box (we seldom use it) with 2 omni's, 2 floods, stands, and all the other stuff that comes with em - the problem is I find they run very very hot and are pain to light with due to having to manipulate them heavily before they produce the type of light I'd like. For a 1610 pelican, I was thinking more along the lines of an LED solution, tho even a 2 light kit is pricy at best.
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Tungsten runs hot all right and very inefficient too. But I love the quality of light when you know how to modulate it. Even though I kinda blazed the trail for LED in video, I still find myself using my 2 Omni's and 2 V-lights and a handful of inky's and an ikea ellipsoidal a fair bit.
My biggest gripes with tungsten are:
1) The inefficiency and thus, intense heat.
2) Long ramp up to stable color temperature about 5 minutes is safe
3) lower color temp with bulb age
4) HUGE amperage draw compared to other lights
Off the shelf 'Branded' LED's are expensive but I'm working on getting some ceiling panels rigged up to be used as movie lights. Imagine am 18"X48" X13mm ceiling light on a yolk for around $400.00
The biggest challenge is getting LED's to match the amazing specular quality of incandescent. For that, I've decided to retrofit a lot of my legacy studio strobe heads with 35W HID instead.
We'll see.

Just steer away from LitePanels. OVERPRICED!
 
Lowel pros and totas with chimeras have got me around the world shooting interviews along with a Cool-Lux kit and a few other whistles and bells and bounce but a 1610 would have been overkill/too large for most of my travel. The Chimeras travel in the Porta Brace tripod bag. If we are talking basic lighting with a kick here and a slash there and so on the above will more than cover my needs. Yeh they get hot and they are not super built but they last and are not expensive, adapt to different voltages and you can buy globes worldwide.
I hear you about LEDs and I have been using them more and more lately with three now in my kit now and I am looking at more as they become less expensive but more consistent in colour and throw. I am sticking with all 5600 LED for now since I find the less expensive dual colour ones are not nearly bright enough for my needs. And I have noticed that some larger cheap ones are very NTSC (never twice the same colour)
 
I am a bit confused about the brightness requirements for interview lights. I see that many recommend and use 1K's, 2K's, along with 500 W and such. Is there a reason behind why so much brightness is needed, especially since many boast about the supersensitive camera sensors that are available ? or perhaps some still do interviews with an Arriflex 35mm and 40 ASA film stock ? I dunno, I seem to get along pretty well with my 3 small led units with 2 umbrellas using a Sony EX3. In most of my shooting, I try to keep a large aperture not only to capture some available ambient room light and have a shallow DOF but also that the lighting brightness requirements are kept to a minimum. My average subject to light distances are always in the 8-10 feet range.
 
I use Lowel Pros and Totas with umbrellas ( shoot-through and black-backed ) and chimera soft-boxes. Compact, flexible, and light-weight. The down-side is the heat and cool-down time before you can pack them up again.

I am looking at adding a couple of FloLight 1x1 LED daylight lights which cost about $800 each, and each puts out as much light as a 650-1000 watt tungsten light.
 
Also a Lowl Rifa worshiper here. I too carry it in a tripod case, along with stands, two Totas and two dimmers. I´ve recently added a Diva400 for daylight interviews, but just take it when I drive to a gig. I´ve also been looking into LED fixtures but the strange color spectrum has kept me from buying so far. I will eventually get one of the cheap 600LED fixtures, just because I fancy having a (kind of) big battery powered light.
http://www.amazon.com/Studio-Photog...&qid=1352414044&sr=8-1&keywords=600+LED+video
 
Norman99 said:
I am a bit confused about the brightness requirements for interview lights. I see that many recommend and use 1K's, 2K's, along with 500 W and such. Is there a reason behind why so much brightness is needed, especially since many boast about the supersensitive camera sensors that are available ? or perhaps some still do interviews with an Arriflex 35mm and 40 ASA film stock ? I dunno, I seem to get along pretty well with my 3 small led units with 2 umbrellas using a Sony EX3. In most of my shooting, I try to keep a large aperture not only to capture some available ambient room light and have a shallow DOF but also that the lighting brightness requirements are kept to a minimum. My average subject to light distances are always in the 8-10 feet range.
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An excellent observation. Where HID ( AKA HMI) and Tungstens in the 500w-1K are handy are not really in interviews ( except in broad daylight oddly enough) , Rather as powerful bouncelight sources. I like natural looking light and so I frequently will bounce Omni's and V-lights off of room ceilings and corners for a broad lighting anf then use my LED's up close and personal. the 1K and 2K are great set lights for outside– day or night, as fall off is huge at distances that LED's simply can't reach.
I will frequently light an interview subject in broad daylight, using a V-light or Tota filtered and bounced off an umbrella or use the Omni full on with a sheet of light spun + a 3/4 CTO for a really prominent 'sunset in your eyes look'.

LED's will get there but it's not an easy climb. I'm dealing with that now using some pretty exotic emitters. I hope we can ditch hot lights soon. TOO MUCH DRAW!
 
TheDingo said:
The down-side is the heat and cool-down time before you can pack them up again.
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Yes. There are some tricks though for speeding pack up.
1) I pack a fresh can of Compressed Air ( AKA Freon) in my kit. 30 seconds after turning a light off, I'll turn the can upside down and from about 12" spray the back and sides with freon. Doesn;t touch the bulb but brings the head down to handling temp :)
 
Spartacus said:
the strange color spectrum has kept me from buying so far.
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??? The cheap Chinese panel lights use crappy and uncultured 'Bin Codes' BUT I have tricks for bringing the cheap lights into alignments with my CRI requirements.

The expensive lights often cost what they do because premium BINs cost more money on the wholesale market.

What cracks me up is that those 1X1 use 1st generation 5mm nichia emitters. That's really stone age!

I will not touch that stuff and rather roll my own from cheap SMD spools of 600 emitters.

Here's me playing.....
 
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