Forget about LED moving heads

Did they manage to get it UL listed? I have heard that Seachanger is having issues getting the Nemo UL listed, so it would be interesting to know how others are doing.
 
So, what are the advantages/disadvantages when compared to LED's?
 
It's an interesting concept and all but there's a few things that I'd like to point out that make me think that all is not lost for LED technology in moving lights.

First, it has a 266W light source and luminous flux of 22,000, that's the exact same as all of the Clay Paky 300W sources and I would guess close to the same as other major manufactures. One of the things that makes LED so attractive is the low power usage vs. light output ratio that they have.

To stick with electronics, they have a source that strikes. Striking a lamp has been the accepted norm for a wide variety of moving lights, but we're not talking about what we have we're talking about the future of lighting, That is what we want in our lights. Any light that doesn't have all the equipment solely for the purpose of striking the lamp will be IMHO lighter and easier to maintain. First of all it says semi-hot re-strike that is a red flag. Hot re-strike is a luxury that not all lights have, but saying semi-hot makes it sound more like a "it might work, it might not" kind of situation that is just filling lines on the company product propaganda. Furthermore and more generally nothing is more infuriating to me than working on a light that won't strike. You can't use a meter cause the potential difference at time of strike is 2000V+, it's instantaneous not consistent power, etc.... If you can remove that part of a light and still make it output a reasonable amount of light I am one of your new supporters.

Lastly it's a 10,000 hour expected lamp life. That's still more than a 10x the lamp life that I've been working with but it's still a lamp that's expected to burn out if you use the fixture quite often (like on a touring show). 10,000 hours is 416 days and change, that's a long time, but the 100,000 hour life time of many LEDs is 11.7 years worth of time. Yes these are all projections and actual usage will make this number vary widely but the bottom line is that if you buy this plasma luminaire you're gonna have it in the back of you mind that some day, for some reason (burn out, mistreatment, poor cooling, etc...) you're going to probably have to buy a new lamp for your unit. If you buy an LED fixture you buy it with the understanding that by the time you have LEDs burning out that fixture will either be relics of a time long gone or an unusable fixtures for some other reason.

Like I said plasma moving lights overall sounds interesting (maybe something like a DL luminaire that I'd actually recommend to someone) but I just don't think that it threatens to end the development on LED moving lights.
 
You have to realize that the plasma lamp technology outs us much closer to the theoretical point source that all focusable fixtures are based on. It is also a dimmable source (though not fully to 0 yet) which means that it can easily be adopted into standard fixtures (ERS, Fresnel, etc) and it is a full spectrum output device with a high CRI. I am sure that it's efficiency will get better, and if you check out the manufacturers info they have lots of interesting facts.

Also, consider this: the Lifi technology is really only a little over a year old and hasn't actually been on the market that long. LED technology has been on the entertainment market for a couple years now and has not yet made it as mainstream as Lifi is about to go when Robe Launches this fixture. The Lifi technology is much more practical, useable, and affordable than LED. IMHO
 
May the best system win! I would not count out LEDs yet. Who knows what is around the corner. Just when we are sure we know who's winning, something will come out of the blue like high power Light Emitting Capacitors! (btw- LECs are real, just pretty dim right now.)
 
May the best system win! I would not count out LEDs yet. Who knows what is around the corner. Just when we are sure we know who's winning, something will come out of the blue like high power Light Emitting Capacitors! (btw- LECs are real, just pretty dim right now.)

I am not counting LEDs out, I just don't think that they will become as practical as fast as Lifi Plasma lamps will.
 
I think these may become the new lamp of choice for the spot type fixtures, but I think things like LED bars, can't be replaced by anything like this. How many years do tungsten bulbs have left?
 
Yeah, the theatre i work at just ordered a couple Robe Robin 500's and i'm actually really excited to work with them and see how they work. But on another note theres been talk about these things completely re-doing everything ETC has done with the Source 4 series and the HPL lamp. Again Cutting Heat projection, Wattage, and increasing the Luminance. But I am writing a paper on this technology so if anyone has any links to any Info on LIFI lamps and technology that wold greatly appreciated.
 
I definitely don't think LED's will ever be out of the game. For one thing, they are dimmable through the full range. They are also great for RGB mixing because they don't need dichroic's to change their color, so they will always most likely have a place in the accent lighting and cyc lighting area's of theatre.
 
Time will tell. I spoke to a few guys about this at an IEEE conference a couple nights ago. Someone usually mentions plasma light sources as jumping over the rise of LED's, but no one has seen then in practice or knows much about them other than that they exist.
 
Cyc lights? like who makes a cyc led? not pretty splodge effects,but like even light from the top to the bottom?I'll buy some.Please post pictures.
 
I think the point that was trying to be made was that the plasma sources seem to be ideal for spot type fixtures, like as a replacement to the Source 4. An LED would be much preferable to a plasma source for a color wash that does not need to be sharp, because your dealing with a ton less power for just one color, then you dont need to hang several different sets of lights. It would be similar if you got a plasma fresnel and then popped a scroller on it, but without having to dim down for a scroller transition. I think that LEDs and Plasma fixtures will have a place in rigs of the future, as Wash and Spot instruments respectively. And I dare say that the HPL will not go completely away either.
 
I didn't mean a picture of the alleged light, I meant a picture of a cyc lit with it.
 

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