Dan, making it harsher is quite easy. You want to make the light eminate from as small a source as possible. Remove all diffusion from in front, of course, then remove the reflector from inside the light. If it is still light-colored inside, paint it with high-temp black paint like that used for backyard grills. I suppose you could just paint the reflector black instead. With the insides black, the light will be eminating from just the lamp itself which is a thin line. Move the light a bit farther back and it will have harsher shadows as it becomes relatively smaller than the subject as distance increases. The opposite of this is a huge white diffuser placed just off-screen from the talent with even light across the diffuser. I think this is essentially what Ben did for his music video shots.

You'll want CTB to use a tungsten light for outdoor.

Sorry about that, thanks for the correction.

Good tip, there, Richard.
 

Didn't realize UV was so strong with these. Your warning sparked some research that pointed out even more things I didn't know about lighting.

Thanks.

Yes and those worklights looks so innocent too don't they. Little did you know a potential danger lurks therein. This was just one more reason I decided I didn't like conventional lighting anymore and went for "Cool Lights". Now I never use hot lights for anything.

Crumple up tinfoil and fit into the reflector. Crumpling breaks up some of the really harsh spectral qualities and, you get a 10-15% boost in brightness.

See Jason's Berman posts in the following thread.
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...hlight=molette

I would not try that with a worklight! The glass is probably there for your safety, i.e. so that you don't accidentally touch the bulb (extremely hot) or get fingerprints on the bulb (it will break/explode). Try it first with a normal household incandescent bulb (people have these hanging bare all the time; they are hot but not ridiculously so)... you probably already have one. Then look at higher wattage stuff like photofloods.

Be careful, use some common sense, actually read the instructions, and wear gloves if handling hot lights.

2- I don't believe the glass is to protect you against UV.

I don't believe that is possible. A fresnel needs a lens to focus the light into parallel beams. Look for a deal on a fresnel light... see the low budget lighting sticky at the top of this forum.

Glenn,

Please don't provide misinformation. A quick check around the web will backup that halogen quartz lights emit UV radiation. And it says clearly on the glass cover of many of these worklights that it is UV PROTECTION. In addition it also helps to keep people from accidentally touching the bulb too while running.

Here's a quote from a website:

http://members.misty.com/don/uvbulb.html

"Halogen bulbs are made of quartz or sometimes a form of "hard glass", both of which usually let through most UVB wavelengths. Undoped quartz passes all UVB and most UVC (not including most "vacuum UV"). Although halogen lamps rated to last 2,000 hours or more have filaments not hot enough to produce much of these wavelengths, it is usually recommended to use a glass shield. In addition to UV hazards, the more compact quartz halogen bulbs operate under great stress and have a slight risk of exploding.
Shorter life photographic and projection halogen lamps have substantially higher filament temperatures and emit significant amounts of UVB. It is important to block this, usually with a glass shield appropriate for the amount of heat encounteded."

Why would you tell someone it's not a problem? Have you done massive research on the subject? Wouldn't it be better to be safe in any case?

light direction
 

I've been reading these photon posts and was thinking.......

Many of the posts talk about this and that light and some even show their results....but....

I worked for 1.5 years at an ABC news affiliate and watched and listened as a tungsten bulb exploded in a Desisti light fixture. Part of the glass ended up in the anchor's eye as he was doing the evening news. The fixtures were supposed to be professional units, but the bulbs went out right and left. I saw a pile of the burned out ones.

I've seen what happened when a hot light was left face down on a new chair in a new office in a new building and someone turned on that fixture.

I was impressed by how fast an old smith victor movie light with a 600 watt bulb could set on fire the protective paper box the bulb came in-about 3 seconds when held close.

I worked on a movie with a 20 million dollar budget when I had to burst into a "hot set" to tell
the director that smoke was rolling off the side of the rented house because their pars were melting the paint.

I watched a 2 year old fall off a table headfirst onto the floor when a photographer (not me, I was looking at cars) turned his back for a second as he was making a portrait of the child at an auto dealership.

Accidents do happen. Sometimes they are not controllable despite best interests of everyone involved. Sometimes people don't use common sense.

It pays to be cautious.

lighting skills
 

It's one thing to have this or that type of light, but what's equally important is to know what to do with the light once you have it.

As a still photographer, I leaned how to create butterfly, split, rembrandt, dracula, whatever lighting effects for portraiture to make the subject look great.

The same techniques apply if you are photographing a computer, band, beauty queen or anything else.

You can use the same principles with $$2,000 fixtures or $3.00 bulbs, bedsheets or silks, direct sunlight and the use of scrims, relectors, trees, building overhangs, light bouncing off the sides of buildings....

Just having lots of lighs and throwing up something to diffuse it to create a "wall of lighting power" isn't going to make your subject look any better if you don't pay attention to the balance between your fill and key lights, if you are using a fill at all. It actually could make them look worse.

Most cities have a group like the Professional Photographers of America or similar organizations. Lots of lighting information can be learned from these groups which directly transfers to video lighting.

Just a thought.

Technique and talent will override any equipment's deficiencies. Lack of these will make the best equipment in the industry useless. I absolutely agree. I like to encourage people to learn with a minimum of investment. Sometimes this means making your own equipment from what you can find cheaply. I use very low light levels to shoot. This allows me to open my iris all the way and regain some control over DoF.

I've spent about $200 on lighting so far.

I have 10 fixtures:
-5 clearanced Craftsman work lights ($5/ea)
-5 $15 ACDelco 8.5 inch reflector clamp lights
-I've thrown away 4 clamp lights that weren't ACDelco's due to the difference in joint construction, they just fell apart.
-using GE Softwhite spiral flourescent lights (careful with your sound, they're buzzy, but almost no heat generated).

I'm building up my collection of gels (donations accepted).

4 stands I either had or were given to me (2 are microphone boom stands).

Various light control implements:
-A large sheet of white fabric from when I used to make ren fest costumes
-A large black semi see through strectchy fabric from a fabric store's wedding section
-3 large (slightly damaged - price reduced) sheets of white foamcore
-1 side of one painted silver, 1 gold)
-1 medium sized black foam core.

Scrap wood, self drilling screws, gumption and ingenuity.

I use careful placement of objects and subjects in the set to use the falloff of lights and bounce as flag to eliminate spill. I have some large cardboard scraps to cut into cookies if I need to texture a background or a subject.

This kit allows me to play around and screw up alot before investing tons of money in stuff I won't have a clue how to use. This is my alternative to film school (family and mortgage preclude my ability to attend and/or pay for film school elsewhere in the world than my little slice of heaven here).

I spent money on a decent camera (XL1s - used, good condition, known owner) and final cut studio (corporate discount and upgrade price on an earlier version of FCP) and shake (same corporate discount) for my G5 (I'm a certified mac tech - so that's a write off).

mac tech
 

Hey, I'm a certified PC tech. Wanna fight?

Sure, you come up with an antiquated reason you don't like macs, I'll tell you why I don't like 286's and then explain that both platforms have moved beyond that point and we should all just get along. :)

...That was sarcasm, BTW.

I've never heard of fluorescents blowing up. Sure they have some of their own issues if you break them but people generally don't get burned by them.