LED Lighting

Hess

PRO user
Hi Everyone,

My boss is looking at some LED lighting.

Bescor 700 Dual Color temp fixtures.

Are these any good??

Anybody using them?? Likes?? DisLikes??

Thanks for any help you can offer.

Have a Great Day!!

Joey
 

Starman

Well-known member
I really like the daylight Dracast. I would rather just put gels in them. They are great 1x1 panels and you can get Chimera soft boxes for them, which are pretty decent considering it's a panel light and not a traditional Chimera setup. Very good color from these lights.
 

Necktie Boy

Well-known member
There a few good threads about LED's. Many have said the weak item on bicolor LED's that you are only use half the strength. Most sport places are daylight balance, I think?

Yes, you can gel them to 32k. You do loose some punch, but it depends how often you go 32k. If you are getting a full set of LED's you will find out that the 56k is fine inside as well. LED's are harsh, so you will need to soften them.

Also go with spots over floods since the spot will be brighter and loose less when gel'ed for 32k. Make sure all the LED's are from the same maker for color matching.

I have been using Flolight's LED's for awhile, and very happy with them.
 
look at the CRI index, with the most recent generation of led lights it should be ideally in the 95 to 98 range. Older versions/technology were often down in the eighty's or lower that's when you would see the green and purple shifts. I do not notice the shift on a good light in the 95 range, Dracast is a good example but by far not the only led technology in that CRI range. I don't know where the models you are referring to fall but I couldn't find any documentation on the website I found in my quick search.

If you are lower expect to need to use some minus green or plus green to correct for the color shift which will again sap some of the punch due to transmission loss.

I also am a proponent of buying for the 56k range (with the exception of prehaps one panel for run and gun situations) and gelling back when necessary, that said I rarely have to actually do it as a lot more modern buildings are 4800-5600k than they used to be or I have full control over the room so light mixing doesn't impact me as much.

Also if do have to go 3200k I almost never need the same punch I would in a mixed light room or daylight room. So losing even as much as 20 or 30% of my output to a gel doesn't really effect me the same as it would going in the other direction.
 

Run&Gun

Well-known member
I have a set of Astra bi-color panels. They have a lot more punch than the "old" bi-color units. I'm not real big on the physical design, but I love the light. I also have the Chimera 1x1 "frameless" soft boxes for them. And most of the time I'm running them "mixed" in the 4300K-4700K range indoors. Occasionally full daylight, but I don't think I've shot with them for real in 3200K. I also "indexed" 32, 43 & 56 on them to my ENG camera that I use them with the most.

CRI isn't always a good metric. There are lights out there that have a high CRI, but still don't have good performance on camera. The newer, "better" measurement is TLCI(Television Lighting Consistency Index).

http://www.gtc.org.uk/tlci-results.aspx
 

Cameradude

Well-known member
If you are using LED's for indoor lighting set-ups you will love them. No heat, low voltage draw and most are battery powered.

If you are wanting to use them for outdoor live shots on a sunny day they will be too small.

There are a lot of brands on the market, with a lot of price points to match what you are doing.
 

2000lux

Well-known member
Check out the Westcott or Aladdin Flex lights. I think they may actually be made by the same factory. They are very bright, color is great, they are waterproof up to the dimmer, and best of all they are very light and versatile. If I was going to buy lights today, that's what I would get.

I much prefer bicolor units. I hate screwing around with gels. One more thing to get lost, and they cut the power of the light way down. It takes much less time to turn a dial. When you're dealing with mixed light, or have odd colored lights in the shot, its really nice to be able to just dial in what you want.

Also, get the floods not the spots. LEDs are kind of harsh to start with. If you're going to use spots you have to diffuse them, which cuts down your output, and never looks quite as good. Just get a couple of powerful bicolor floods and you'll be happy.
 

Hess

PRO user
Thanks for the feedback. All good stuff. I'll let you know what we get and how they work.

Best,

Joey
 

Douglas

Well-known member
If you are wanting to use them for outdoor live shots on a sunny day they will be too small.
That's not necessarily true anymore. The new Litepanels ASTRA 1x1s and the Litepanels Sola fresnels ( in 4", 6", 9", or 12" sizes) provide a lot of punch even on sunny day. Without some diffusion is is likely more than your talent can even handle.
 

Starman

Well-known member
Question, does anybody see an issue using Dracast LED panels along with Litepanels Sola and matching the color? Or should I buy Dracast LED fresnels instead?
 

Capt. Slo-mo

Well-known member
Check the listed weight on the Dracast fresnel. They seem extraordinarily heavy, especially compared to the Litepanels fresnels.
 
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