LED vs Conventional

Ancient Engineer said:

Well, so long as I am tricked.



LED instruments are good for many things.

They make adequate light for many situations and are cheap.

Cheapness, simplicity, and reduced heat are their primary benefits.

Quality of light (thus far) is not amongst their best traits. Oh sure, they will dial around their peaky spectrums and make bountiful color options available.

But a instrument that can make a flat, full spectrum white at 3250K is not there yet (at least at a price point that is reasonable, I'm looking at you Arri).

The peaky spectrum in "white" LEDs (warm or cool) is instantly noticable when applied to flesh-tones.

And, yup like TuckerD said, you can fool us by using more than one instrument or picking one with extra emitters, etc..

Now my workaround trick has me looking at a $60 8" Fresnel because the quality of the light is so frikkin good and it is simple.

Not nearly as simple as standing at the GrandMA and whizzing the whiz wheel to get something "good enough".

I'll give you three examples of incandescent fixtures in use all the time today because there is not a good single LED equal.

1. 9-light Fay (or 12-light Fay)
2. 10K Fresnel for motion picture work.
3. Follow spot with a 250' throw giving 300fc+ @5600k

Debate me, or prove to me that Panera Bread is not just overpriced hospital food...

Click to expand...

AMEN. -- What he said! LEDs are colorful and getting better daily-- but they give no where near the light QUALITY that Tungsten Halogen does. If you want realism, you still can't beat TH sources. They offer other benefits (energy, maintenance, etc.), but you are sacrificing quality in exchange for other features (color mixing) and those benefits. They don't do everything. It's really just another tool in the box, not a replacement for Tungsten-- but an alternate source to Tungsten. Just like a Plane isn't a car. They will both get you to St. Louis-- but one of them gets you there faster, and one let's you stop at your favorite roadside diner. ;-)

DELO72 said:

AMEN. -- What he said! LEDs are colorful and getting better daily-- but they give no where near the light QUALITY that Tungsten Halogen does. If you want realism, you still can't beat TH sources. They offer other benefits (energy, maintenance, etc.), but you are sacrificing quality in exchange for other features (color mixing) and those benefits. They don't do everything. It's really just another tool in the box, not a replacement for Tungsten-- but an alternate source to Tungsten. Just like a Plane isn't a car. They will both get you to St. Louis-- but one of them gets you there faster, and one let's you stop at your favorite roadside diner. ;-)

Click to expand...

Yeah. And the quality of writing was better on manual typewriters.

Technology is where it is for various reasons, most of which have little to nothing to do with our little profession. We are a small market and we have great minds producing wonderful products but we rely on materials dictated by larger industries. That being said where we are and where we are going are two very different places. There is no doubt in my mind that the HPL will eventually go the way of the dodo, however, I have yet to find a profile full color LED that I am comfortable replacing my main space FOH with yet. Chauvet makes a white light leko that I really like but it requires my to use gel still so why change? I have Colorsource spots in my concert hall, for the needs of that venue they are the right fixture. All three of my spaces have upgraded to LED wash, yet I still pull out S4pars for road shows. With all this, all three venues have gone through upgrades with the plan that someday we will be using mostly LED fixtures. Every plan we have to upgrade venues includes some dimming staying. Why, because you never know.

So, in my round about way, what I'm saying is this. We live in a transitional period. Some of you are old enough to remember when there was no ETC console, or S4. How long did it take to replace all of your Six by lights with S4s? I'll let you know when I get the last couple sets out of my dance booms. I love my LED wash lights. I wouldn't lose them for anything. But there are occasions that I need one more light and the only option is conventional.

I work at a university. We teach our students how to light a stage. We give them tools to do their assignments. Some are LED, some are HPL, EHG, FEL and even PAR. Expose people to the theory and let them experiment with the tools. Let them find out what works and what does not in any particular application. I leaned to light with PAR cans. Yep, rock and roll shows, theater and opera with only PARs. Why, it's what we had. We have a lot more toys now, but there are still lots of places where old technology is still in use. You need to be able to use what ever is available or you will have a good chance of losing that gig. Will LED take over the world, good chance. But then again didn't everyone think CFLs would take over the household lighting world.

As for quality of light, in my humble opinion, I say that there is no light source in the world as full and pure as a carbon arc super trooper. But that damn Clay Paky light with a laser source, oh my!

We're going to have to agree to disagree, Bill.

BillConnerFASTC said:

Yeah. And the quality of writing was better on manual typewriters.

Click to expand...

With FAR fewer FAT-FINGERED keying errors. (I've heard Moses did well while chiseling the tablets).
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard