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durable fixtures for shipping
What lighting gear have you found to be the most indestructible for shipping? LED? Fluoro? Tungsten? and what brands? Mole? KinoFlo? Lightpanels? etc.
Matches and kindling?
I find that I bring redundant fixtures, just to be sure I have a complete kit that works — and I’m trying to travel and to ship lighter.
Thanks.
Bob C
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25 Replies
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I think it’s a pretty clear call that LED instruments are by far the lightest weight (per output), and will also fare best as far as abuse/shipping goes.
Now, what flavors and brands, I couldn’t say. Our lighting arsenal is a total mishmash of stuff, so I’ve never been married that much to any one brand (except for fresnels, love LTM peppers).
T2
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Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
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The old standby method was to ship the fixtures, sans bulbs, and pick up bulbs locally near the location.
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I’d say florescent are by far the worst for shipping since the bulbs can break easily and getting local replacements would be a rarity in all but the largest production markets. Tungsten and HMIs can have the same problem, but the bulbs are much smaller and easier to remove and stick into a backpack with you, can’t really do that with flos. I never fly with even Divas these days if I can help it, even with extra padding the bulbs have broken on me.
With LEDs, I agree with Todd, they’re probably the easiest lumens per watt in terms of portability and would probably hold up fine. Some LED units aren’t the most durable in general though since a lot are plastic-y and/or not really designed to take abuse. The Litepanels Astra for instance has a large plastic shell that I’ve seen crack easily, especially around the power supply. I’m not knocking Litepanels, in general they’ve held up fine but I have seen multiple Astras that have cracks in them. The LED units I use mostly are the Area 48 panels and Dedolight DLEDs, which are both high-quality metal fixtures with heat sinks that are quite thick.
Tungsten or HMI heads, at least Arri, Mole, or K5600, I’ve never had a problem with. You’d literally have to TRY to break a Mole fixture, and Arris can be put into their kit cases and fly all over and remain mostly unscathed, perhaps bending a piece of metal back into place, but that’s about it. So overall, I’d stick to LED or tungsten where you can easily remove the bulbs if desired…and CERTAINLY do this with HMIs.
Regardless of what type of fixture you choose, if durability is a prime concern, stick with established name-brand fixtures or high-end newer ones that have quality materials. It’s more expensive, but worth it in this case. The easiest way lower-end units or knockoffs save money to offer lower prices is in the build quality and materials. Arri, Mole, Kino, K5600, Dedo, or LTM have to take abuse as rental units and are built to spec accordingly.
Which units do you have in mind?
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[Erik Anschicks] “Which units do you have in mind?”
For local shoots I use a Diva, fresnels (Mole and Pepper), various Chimeras, & Source 4.
Travel: the fresnels, Chimeras. I use D-lights and Tota-lights for the Chimeras; I really like Tota’s for travel: cheap, small, and I have enough that I can just swap them out if a bulb goes in the middle of a shoot.
I have had good luck shipping the Diva, but I’ve only done it when I could afford a huge, heavily-padded case.
Thanks Terry, Mark, Erik. I was very interested in all the responses. The weakness in my travel kit is anything daylight. So I’m very interested in the suggestion of LEDs, though the tough ones seem expensive.
Thanks again!
Bob C
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Yeah, the price of excellent daylight LED (or any fixtures, really) lights is always the drawback. That being said, they open up SO many more possibilities and lessen almost every drawback to location shooting imaginable, from heat, to color temp matching, to power draw, to location logistics, etc. I have moved almost entirely to daylight lights in my standard kit these days, a mixture of hard and soft light LED, flo, HMI, and plasma. If it’s an area you’re lacking in as you say, I would very seriously consider such methods.
The power draw in particular, or really the lack thereof, has been a near-magical game changer to working this way. Using a combination of my lights, I can get the approximate lumens equivalent of almost 13K worth of tungsten on a SINGLE 15 amp circuit. If I have 2 clean circuits and ran the LEDs from battery power, I can nearly double that adding a 1200 par or two, though honestly I very rarely power the LEDs via battery if AC power exists where I am.
Of course, this is really only worth it if the type of shooting you do lends itself to these methods! For me, a lot of my bread-and-butter shoots tend to be location ones where we don’t know what exactly we’re walking into and have to bring as much as space and budget allow to handle almost anything you could expect from a small to large(ish) location. Maximum flexibility from our G&E kits is top priority, which is most easily accomplished with daylight fixtures and the aforementioned advantages they offer. Replacing existing practical lighting from most bulbs found in household lamps or fixtures is no problem either, as I’ll also bring some of the daylight-balanced screw-in bulbs that Kino Flo makes so I can change out practicals or use in china balls. Having the ability to be able to attack almost any situation and having an ideal fixture to draw upon for whatever that particular shot needs ultimately makes things a WHOLE lot easier for us.
An added bonus is the fact that many of these newfangled daylight fixtures are relatively compact and lightweight designs with portability in mind, so you can maximize your cargo space as well. All of my lights plus a pretty complete G&E kit, a complete cine camera package and two carts fit easily into my Chevy Traverse.
I still kept all my older tungsten units, but I find I really only use them in very specific situations, such as matching existing lighting in night exteriors or to obtain a warm, almost candlelight feel for a nighttime interior. Otherwise, 5600K is my new standard.
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[Erik Anschicks] “the price of excellent daylight LED “
What’s excellent? I’d be interested in peoples’ experience with the large variety of LEDs now.
LEDs seem particularly difficult to evaluate: CRI figures are very suspect (aren’t they just supplied by the manufacturer?), and component quality and durability are impossible to judge. I can tell which ones have plastic housings on the outside, but I can’t tell who has better quality control over the solder joints and the capacitors on the circuit boards inside.
The prices of LEDs are all over the map, and I’m not sure that higher-priced necessarily means better quality. A thorough-going “shoot-out” of LEDs would be a great topic for one of the trades.
Tungsten is going out, but there’s something to be said for the simplicity of screwing a light bulb into a socket that is wired to a wall outlet.
Thanks very much for the feedback.
Bob C
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[Bob Cole] “LEDs seem particularly difficult to evaluate”
I agree that sussing out quality in LED fixtures is messy and difficult. I was relatively late to jumping into the LED pool for exactly this reason, I waited out various incarnations of them until I finally found some that I was happy enough with to use as primary lamps for uses beyond run and gun. In no particular order, here are a few of the things I learned along the way that might prove helpful.
1. TLCI.
Look at TLCI (Television Lighting Consistency Index) rather than CRI. CRI figures aren’t just suspect because of what manufacturers say, they’re not the most accurate way of determining color. Enter Alan Roberts, a highly esteemed BBC engineer who came up with a better way of determining color fidelity based on how modern television sensors and other equipment render color. Rather than my summarizing, here’s a helpful link: https://www.cinema5d.com/led-light-accuracy-tlci/
Note that within the article you can download the most up to date TLCI performances of most major LED lights from independent tests conducted by Roberts, NOT the manufacturers. I’ve found this to be an excellent starting place to evaluate LEDs, not just because of the results but also because the most reputable manufacturers will openly publish their results and/or provide them if asked. The lesser ones will not and simply hide behind a CRI they tell you that there is indeed no way to easily verify.
2. Convenience vs. Aesthetics. Which matters more to you for your work?
I say “vs” because in my experience, LEDs that prioritize convenience and all-built-in features have to have a catch somewhere and usually that is they often don’t give the most optimal light quality and are simply designed to pour out light that can somewhat blend with most environments. I’m sure there are people that disagree with this, but I believe they are marketed more towards run and gun type shooting where color fidelity and output don’t matter as much since there’s usually not time to properly light or you’re just going with what’s existing and filling in. Now this being said, whether or not this matters depends entirely on the work you do. If you need the speed, it’ll be fine and probably even preferable given the cost differences. Anything beyond that though…
As an example of a difference, the Area 48 or Cineo lamps might (and have) turn some people off because you have to manually swap panels rated for different color temperatures instead of simply turning a dial. However, this results in better color fidelity because it’s the phosphors in the panels themselves that control the color, bypassing the inherent color limitations of LED bulbs themselves. This not only results in better color, but they also remain color-stable over long continuous periods, whereas others tend to go green or otherwise shift over time. Do these small differences matter as much? That’s a matter of personal use and opinion. To me for my work, they do, but YMMV. Just something I’ve noticed.
3. Build Quality and specs.
Along the same lines as #2, I’ve also found that the best units also tend to be a bit heavier than plastic panels. I like units that utilize metal parts and heat sinks as opposed to fans, which you CAN hear in sound-sensitive environments. Most of the better ones will also be flicker-free and utilize a bit beefier but more stable power supply. They will often also use 4 pin XLR cables and connectors instead of a cheap plastic connector. Many will also have DMX capability (if you need that sort of thing) and the ability to program special features.
4. Playing well with others.
One of the first things that impressed me about the units I have is how well they blended with my existing Kinos and HMIs. I can’t put my finger on exactly HOW this is done or how it varies, but there have been some units I’ve tested that didn’t go green or magenta but were just plain warmer or didn’t really match well with other units that weren’t LEDs. My hunch is that the better companies actively test and compare their products to these other established fixtures and put a priority on blending the light quality as best they can. Now obviously this requires hands-on testing, but it’s well worth it in the end to get a demo model or rent a unit you’re considering to see how it can integrate into your current setup.
I know this is kind of a book, but hopefully it can start to de-mystify some matters. It’s of course by no means gospel, just my opinions and observations after utilizing these types of fixtures extensively over the last couple of years and learning as much as I can in the process!
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I’m going to go out on another limb and go against the orthodoxy here a bit.
First, my money where my mouth is, two weeks ago I sold off ALL my tungsten.
Yes, it was really tough to let go of my 20 year collection of Arri Fresnels and Lowel Totas and the dozens of other tungsten fixtures I’ve been accumulating my whole career – BUT – they were heavy and inefficient and regardless of how beautiful and well understood the light they produced was – to me I just couldn’t get past their horrible inefficiencies. Power draw, weight and most of all the SPACE it took to own and maintain all the ancillary gear needed to run them. Heavier stands. Long heavy stingers. Weighty barn doors and grip arms and pantographs in my studio. I honestly started to feel the infrastructure of tungsten was weighing me down. So it’s now gone.
I also have a significant investment in color balanced fluorescent in my studio. BUT – again, these are weighty and while the light is lovely (I have both 5600 and 3200 lamps for all of them) I just can’t get past the feeling their brief time has come and gone.
Which brings me to the love/hate of the modern LED world.
Everyone agrees their power/weight/electrical efficiency is miles better than the other stuff.
BUT today the light production is inexact and often a problem. What to do?
For me, it was noticing that on my last few shoots, when I needed more light in a hurry – and I grabbed one of my low cost “test” plastic LEDs units – the resulting footage, as captured by a Canon C-100 in modern Sheraton hotel ballroom and breakout room lighting – and brought into FCP X – barely needed correcting and looked great! And these weren’t high priced fixtures. They were literally the $30 off-shore LED units I was testing to replace my old Totas as battery powered fill lights.
They are cheap crap and YES they will likely break. But I have to wonder if thats all that important any more? I could pack 10 of them in a plastic case – (for weight, not quality) nestled in pick and pluck foam – and if they tip over and smash, I’d just grab another – and it’s a $30 problem. No more than a lamp burnout in one of my old Arris. Plus with the new tools I have in FCP X – as long as I understand the issues of MIXED light and address that in the field. (filters are your friend!) I’ve been just fine.
The bigger problem is that I haven’t developed strategies and accessories yet to fully get the quality of results I desire out of the new kit. But I think I will. And if I do, then I might achiever my real goal. A kit I can take anywhere and light properly with – in a fraction of the space and with a fraction of the power I needed once upon a time.
I think the future is going to be about a continued trend towards a separation of the light generating element from it’s “modifier housings.” I’m already seeing this in the photographic realm where companies have a long history of making lightweight modifiers for flash units. Clearly something good for a flash isn’t going to cut it on a high-heat AC-sucking tungsten source, but an LED source? It might be fine.
It was a post right here in this forum that got me to reconsider the idea of using umbrellas as bounce diffusers. Now I own 6 of them. And they work as well with an LED as they did with an Arri Fresnel!
Also look at the innovation happening in LED. I was reading about the Rosco edge-lit panel style LED fixtures just yesterday. The pace of development on the LED side is blazing.
Perhaps someday we’ll fly to our locations with just our tiny light generation kits – and order up modifiers and even light modifying lenses to shape the light from the local 3D print shop!
Bottom line for me. I’ve got to let go of what I know and learn new stuff.
It’s the world I live in now.Your mileage will ABSOLUTELY vary.
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Thanks Bill. Care to be specific about the inexpensive yet effective LEDs you’re using?
I don’t quite follow what you’re saying about light modifiers. What exactly are you talking about, and why should that change, even if the source of the light does?
Bob C
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Bill, I think you’re right on with the trends you’re describing in custom modifiers. For some, the flexibility this allows for is a major selling point.
For example, Hive Lighting plasma and Hexolux (Visionsmith) LED units are now offering custom modifiers for their base lamps which seem to be lifted straight from the strobe world, such as beauty dishes, dome-style umbrellas, and large octagonal softboxes. Hive is also allowing use of a Source Four barrel on their larger Wasp unit, similar to what K5600 made possible with their “Jo-Leko” kit.
Bill’s wish of a universal lighting kit with an unbelievably small footprint, both in actual size and power draw, is closer than ever. I too have been on a journey towards just that, and portable modifiers and accessories are the real key because they are what’s going to make a very small light look like a much larger source! That’s the one thing larger units have going for them, the inherent softness. It’s why whenever possible I’ve always preferred 4×4′ Kinos to the Divas, their size makes them quite noticeably softer right out of the box whilst being about equal in brightness.
However, a smaller light or two bright enough to bounce or make a booklight out of with an 8×8′ silk and bounce material that can pack into a small case or two? That’s gold for any traveling shooter. I’ve been picking up a bunch of parts that help achieve this goal over the last couple of years and it’s really helped me build confidence that I can handle most locations without a truck!
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