ETC Vivid-R test

[SteveB]

As part of a demo by the NYC ETC field office yesterday of the Gio and Ion consoles for out Dept. of Theater folks, I got to test 2 Selador Vivid-R's, 21" models in a side-by-side taste test to my L&E MR-16 cyc light system.

The Vivid's were hung on a pipe 2'-5" downstage of our white cyc and about 6" further US then our existing MR-16's.

We used a 40 deg. horizontal lens and a 20 deg. vertical lens.

I turned on the SL set of MR-16's and had the Vivid's on the SR side of the cyc. The Vivid's lit the entire 30 vertical feet of cyc as well if not better then what you see in the photo of my MR16 wash. Thus I was happy to find that I would not require a double set of fixtures in an over/under configuration as done with my current MR16's. The Vivid fixtures were hung close side by side and blended well to each other.

No I did not get time to take a pic !.

The intensity was stunning, especially in the blue. The colors in the MR16's were Rosco 125 Blue, 124 Red and 126 Green. In a matched blue, the Vivid's matched the MR-16 output when the LED's were at 40% of their intensity. In the red and green, the Vivid's matched when they were at 80 %. There were no problems matching colors and I could have (and did) go to deeper red and blue as desired. If anything I could see a need to typically use the Vivid's at lower intensities as they are so friggin bright.

My MR-16's strips as hung are 6 across the electric, times 2 rows, so 12 total strips. Lamps are all 75 watt, with 360 lamps @75 watts ea, so 27,000 watts. If I were to do the same thing with Vivid's I would buy the 21" version and use 20 fixtures to light about 40 horizontal feet. The wattage load would be 5,000 watts total. They would also require 320 addresses and console channels to get individual control of all 7 colors per cell (2 cells per 21"), with an 8th intensity channel per cell. As BTW, the reason for my preference for the 21" version is my electric is a winch pipe so I'm not worried about weight, and by using the smaller version, I can easily remove them and place them elsewhere as individual floor wall washers, etc... so greater flexibility with the smaller units.

I have two unresolved issues.

1) How do they light a painted drop. Due to the very narrow bandwidth of the LED's, there are obvious peaks and valleys in light output across the range of color temperature. Thus there may well be tints of paint that fall between the LED's output and may not get seen. ETC uses 7 different LED colors to try to fill in these valleys, but only a taste test would discover any issues and I had no time yesterday to hang a drop.

2) Trying to match colors to existing standard color filters from incandescent units. This is a issue for a road house that see's a lot of events that have minimal time to cue a show. I typically get a show file to load to the Ion console, and can only spend the time with a visiting company LD or SM to speedily adjust levels. having to re-build the cyc looks to odd colors would be conceivably very time consuming. An example of this was the story Peter Wiegand, the ETC rep told us about a tour of The Lion King that was converting the cyc lighting to LED's. They built a mockup of the cyc at Hudson Scenic, half lit with the same incandescent setup as typically used on the tours, adjacent to the new LED system. They loaded the show cues into one console, looked at every cue and matched the look with the LED's. It took 2 months.

This is actually a follow up to the MR16 vs. R40 thread, where others have recommended LED's. I agree with that. If you have the money, it's a great system for a cyc. Do a taste test (with other systems as well and light a cyc as well as a backdrop. Then choose.

 

[030366]

Hey there! I have Vivid-Rs at my theatre. I don't know the answer as far as lighting a painted drop goes, but we had one designer light a cyc with both an electric of SkyCycs and a Vivid-R ground row. I do have to say, when he used both for a single colour, he was able to blend the SkyCycs and the LEDs seamlessly to each other. That said, though, he was only using blues at the time. Still.....a gorgeous look.

I didn't do any experimenting with the manufacturer's colors part of the color picker, though. I'm not sure how easy it would be to pick up a show and drop it into LED.

 

[icewolf08]

1) How do they light a painted drop. Due to the very narrow bandwidth of the LED's, there are obvious peaks and valleys in light output across the range of color temperature. Thus there may well be tints of paint that fall between the LED's output and may not get seen. ETC uses 7 different LED colors to try to fill in these valleys, but only a taste test would discover any issues and I had no time yesterday to hang a drop.

2) Trying to match colors to existing standard color filters from incandescent units. This is a issue for a road house that see's a lot of events that have minimal time to cue a show. I typically get a show file to load to the Ion console, and can only spend the time with a visiting company LD or SM to speedily adjust levels. having to re-build the cyc looks to odd colors would be conceivably very time consuming. An example of this was the story Peter Wiegand, the ETC rep told us about a tour of The Lion King that was converting the cyc lighting to LED's. They built a mockup of the cyc at Hudson Scenic, half lit with the same incandescent setup as typically used on the tours, adjacent to the new LED system. They loaded the show cues into one console, looked at every cue and matched the look with the LED's. It took 2 months.

A couple things. Let me play the role I always play when people come to me touting LEDs, kind of a devils advocate role. First off, despite using less power, you are going from 12 fixtures to 20. You are buying 20 fixtures that cost at least double what the MR-16s cost (if not more). I assume you have some kind of capital equipment budget that makes this an option. How quickly will the reduced power consumption balance out the initial cost of the fixtures? Do you have the DMX distribution infrastructure to handle adding these fixtures?

I have to say, I am happy to see that you tried to compare apples to apples though. So many people try to compare LED strips to traditional CYC lights, which just doesn't cut it. I have yet to see an LED product that compares to a traditional 1kW cyc light with t-3 lamp and J-type reflector. The Altman spectra-cyc is promising, but not there yet for drops the size that I need to light. The Strand PL-cyc, is not even close based on what I have seen.

Now, as far as painted drops go, I can't say, we haven't tried to light ours with LEDs. I would love to know the answer to this question as well.

As far as color matching goes, if you are using an ETC Eos family console (Eos, Gio, Ion, even Element) with your ETC Selador fixture, you should get very close color rendering using the gel-picker on the console. It may not be 100% perfect, but it usually works (and much closer with ETC's own fixtures). Now if you were trying to match a mixed color from traditional cyc lights, that is a different story. But there will always be a transition period while people start to use and get used to new technology.

 

[SteveB]

Alex, To clarify the setup

You are buying 20 fixtures that cost at least double what the MR-16s cost (if not more). I assume you have some kind of capital equipment budget that makes this an option. How quickly will the reduced power consumption balance out the initial cost of the fixtures?

Yes I'd be buying new gear to replace older gear that is no longer manufactured. The "newer" versions of the now discontinued L&E Mini-Strip uses a socket that is very failure prone. Yes, the new design allows easier socket replacement, but I'm still having a labor cost in repeatedly fixing sockets. I have 3 remaining original models from 25 years ago, these are very difficult (if not impossible) and time consuming to fix, worse then the new version. I attempted to purchase some replacement fixtures when I heard L&E was going under, but was too late. The alternative would be to convert to the Altman Zip-Strip, but that would require purchasing 12 in order to stay with one model, which is of a different physical size and uses a different color frame then the L&E. That's also a pricey option - about $10,000 and I will continue to have the very same socket issues, as it's essentially the same cheap MR16 socket used in architectural fixtures everywhere.

Electrical energy savings is a non-issue, as far as I know, due to our being a State if NY agency that gets cheap electricity from the State Power Authority. We don't see a bill for electricity. So I'm not really contemplating this for that reason, though I might be able to sell the concept to the college along those lines. I do free up a 6 circuit multi and that would be useful.

Do you have the DMX distribution infrastructure to handle adding these fixtures?

Yes, compete Net2 infrastructure, though I would need a 2 port node and need to install another e-net jack, as well as 2 relay modules. The console is an Ion and we have enough addresses to handle this.

Now, as far as painted drops go, I can't say, we haven't tried to light ours with LEDs. I would love to know the answer to this question as well. As far as color matching goes, if you are using an ETC Eos family console (Eos, Gio, Ion, even Element) with your ETC Selador fixture, you should get very close color rendering using the gel-picker on the console. It may not be 100% perfect, but it usually works (and much closer with ETC's own fixtures). Now if you were trying to match a mixed color from traditional cyc lights, that is a different story. But there will always be a transition period while people start to use and get used to new technology.

The match to traditional cyc and colors is one issue. There is currently no magic wand you can wave at the console and have it match to a cue that is lit with R64, R68 and R80. It's all by eye, as the Lion King folks had to do. As to drops ?, a taste test is required. John McKernon wrote a comment (can't find it) about attempting to use LED cyc units on a drop at Goodspeed Opera, I believe and was frustrated with the results. I'm still looking for that comment.

 

[icewolf08]

It is actually all very interesting to me and I would love to here how it goes. OUr development department was just approached by the power company regarding grants for sustainable theatrical lighting, so it has been something I have been contemplating as well. However, we do many painted drops, all painted in house, so it would be a real bummer if LEDs made them look less pretty. as far as use for other applications like PARs or or even using the newer LED profiles, it has always seemed so expensive to get into when you can get three source fours for the price of one source four LED, or 10-ish Source Four Pars for the price of the Selador PAR-type fixtures. I mean if I had a capitol equipment budget, that might be a different story, but I don't.

 

[derekleffew]

On the topic of metamerism / LEDs lighting painted drops, I thought this article enlightening: http://www.mikewoodconsulting.com/articles/Protocol Spring 2010 - Color Rendering.pdf .
The specific pigment used greatly determines the eye's response under LED light. How might that go over? "Sorry, Mr. Scenic Artist, but you can't use Cerulean Blue, Antimony Orange, or Yellow Ochre anymore; my cyclights don't like them." But, just as there's more than one way to skin a cat, there's more than one way to mix the (seemingly) same color using RGB+. Use this as a feature, not a shortcoming.

... John McKernon wrote a comment (can't find it) about attempting to use LED cyc units on a drop at Goodspeed Opera, I believe and was frustrated with the results. I'm still looking for that comment.

(Perhaps too pragmatic, but...) Why not just ask johnmcsoft?
.