Stills + Motion + what lighting

[bavanor]

Now that we are crossing the boundaries into doing both stills and video how are you seeing your lighting needs change?  Are you still using strobes for stills and then bringing in tungsten or HMI continuous lighting.  Or are you starting to sell off your strobes and purchase or only rent continuous lighting and if so what type (Tungsten, fluorescent, LED, HMI)?  There is a huge price difference once you go to HMI even compared to high end strobes.

This question popped in my head once I read the post on the wrangler website.  As our business starts to grow into motion (video) I keep thinking about my lighting needs and how they are changing.

What are your thoughts?

Aaron Britton

[Andre R]

Like many other in the same situation we are waiting for a small revolution in new lighting gear that can solve this challenge...

What I personally need is a '6kw multi purpose flicker free continuous daylight flash bulb' (the type that don't heat up...) that goes straight into the socket of my profoto heads

.... but I also realize that what I 'want' will be close to impossible to achieve of pure practical reasons.

One example: One of the main reason for me to use MFDB is to get a higher flash sync to be able to darken the sky during midday and lit up the subject (very often a model) with flash for the model to pop. To achieve this 'effect' with continuous light someone told me I would need a 12K HMI fresnel one meter away from my model. I 'accidentally' passed in front of such a light once...just for a second of two....and I got a nice tan! The point is that the model would not be able to work comfortably in front of such a light at that distance (I know the approach would be different for film probably to use mesh behind the model).

I think you will have to think 'the other way around' and get lighting gear suitable for film and then shoot stills (with limitations) using that light. Personally I'm using reflectors more than ever as I work mostly on location and are not able to carry a HMI rig at the moment.

Anyway, it should be interesting to see what solutions that will have to surface in the near future.

AndreR