"ban the incandescent" !?!

ref: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/14/business/14light.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

 

"WASHINGTON, March 13 ? A coalition of industrialists, environmentalists and

energy specialists is banding together to try to eliminate the incandescent

light bulb in about 10 years.

 

"In an agreement to be announced Wednesday, the coalition members, including

Philips Lighting, the largest manufacturer; the Natural Resources Defense

Council; and two efficiency organizations, are pledging to press for efficiency

standards at the local, state and federal levels. The standards would phase out

the ordinary screw-in bulb, technology that arose around the time of the

telegraph and the steam locomotive, and replace it with compact fluorescents,

light-emitting diodes, halogen devices and other technologies that may emerge....."

 

is anyone else horrified at the prospect of never again being able to do

available light indoor photography except by the ghastly illumination of

florescent bulbs?

 

(this would be a nightmare for available light wedding photography.)

well, the new flourescent bulbs aren't that bad to shoot under. Flourescents these days arent' the flickery colorcast horrors they used to be. And with digital, if its too cool temperature wise you can always up the color temp a touch...I think it's much better to use a bulb that lasts years and uses way less energy in the end...

 

What is going to be challenging is companies that make lighting systems to make flourescent modelling lights...they might actually last for once.

Pico is right, and LEDs are taking off too (e.g., http://www.zylight.com/). I won't be sorry to see incandescents go. Besides, there are more important things than photography.

General Electric, Osram Sylvania and Wal-Mart are also getting behind alternative bulbs; so traditional light bulbs will probably be slowly discontinued. When compact flourescents first appeared, they were dim, had that flourescent bulb hum and cast the typical blue-green flourescent light. Bulb manufacturers are starting to improve the compact flourescent bulb:

 

 

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-bulb4_jdxbxpnc,0,93325.photo?coll=la-home-headlines

Eventually it will be a blessing rather than a nightmare because daylight spectrum lights are available now, and through the scale of economy will become better and less expensive.

Just use a filter, or correct in Photoshop. People don't like these things because they're

wierd-looking. The color cast can be taken care of with a shade. I've replaced all the

incandescent bulbs in my place with the flourescents - and I've noticed the lower bills. If it's

a choice between wierd and higher energy bills, I'll take wierd.

the cost or manufactuiring eitherr flourescent or led replacement lamps is greater that the old-fashioned incadescent lamp.

 

auto uses of leds is increasing as most big trucks now use a led array for tail and marker lights.

 

how we approach power savings and generation in this country will either speed up or slow down the adoption or bulbs

that are newer than incasescant designs.

 

the real change will come when new lamp designs are introduced that cannot accept a "screw-in" edison base bulb.

 

the stick halogen 200/500 watt Toercherie lamps are now extinct because of the severe fire hazard.

 

market forces rather than common sense often determines how things happen.

Hi,

 

It is absolutely amazing to me that it has taken this long and will still take so many years..

 

cheers Steve.

i shot a wedding reception held in a hall illuminated by these screw-in fluorescent lights. the the effect on skin tones was horrid as far i was concerned, even after Photoshopping every shot in post- production (fortunately the clients were not bothered by it).

 

let government decide the goal; let the market find the way to achieve it. (anyone remember the fiasco Japan got itself into, unsuccessfully trying to mandate the eventual format of HDTV?)

 

btw, wedding photography may not be that important in the scheme of things. but, after the written word, photography is the most important communication medium of history. just ask Rodney King, Abu Gharib inmates, or (former) Senator George Allen.

 

there's no economic or technological requirement that "green" be equivalent to ghastly green.

Those fluorescents that caused the green cast may be older bulbs - the cast on newer ones

is not bad at all. Two shots here, of my cat Zooty ( already semi-famous, if you saw the

previous posting about cats ) under a compact fluorescent - Dreb XTi, on AWB. One with cast,

and one with one-click levels applied ( ISO 1600 ).<div></div>

Second shot - with levels applied. Not perfect, but not green.<div></div>

It is strange how, whenever someone uses the word "ghastly", I find myself almost automatically on the opposing side. Especially if the word "horrified" is anywhere in the vicinity. Why is that?

The compact fluorescents are here to stay. I went to a seminar at B&H on studio lighting where the studio was completely compact and portable fluorescents. They were not cheap Home Depot lights but specifically tuned to about 5K Kelvins and the results were spectacular. (Or maybe the model was so beautiful I didn't notice the lights.)The lights have the advantage of staying cool, being more economical on electricity, (not on initial outlay) and allowing the photog to see exactly what the image is going to be on his LED display on the back of his camera or on a monitor if connected. Oh...you are shooting digital aren't you. Actually the future doesn't look all that bad to me:) Regards Bernie

no problem, Joe -- i'm "horrified" at the thought of a bride's skin tones, based upon the shots just posted.

I made the switch to the new compact flourescents and my electric bill dropped about $40 a month. Part of that savings is due to less airconditioning costs because tungsten bulbs throw a lot of heat. I'm in Miami, FL but people in colder climes might find that tungsten bulbs cut their heating costs. I bought the C.F. bulbs in multi-packs at Home Depot and pretty much paid for them the first month with the savings on electricity.

 

Color wise they're not all that bad and with a tiny bit of fill flash they seem just fine.

Who cares -- it is about time wedding photographers began to

implement their own lighting.

CFL's have lots of advantages but it's stupid for governments to waste time trying to force the change. We're not talking about that much energy savings. Lighting is a tiny fraction of total electrical consumption.

 

There's no point in having a ban on incandescent light bulbs. People should be free to use them where they feel the bulbs are needed, such as in studio lighting. As CFL's improve, people will naturally migrate towards them to save a little money on their electric bills. All they need is to see an ad at Walmart, try one out, and decide they like it. Even without any laws incandescent bulbs will be rare in 10 years time, so why have a ban on something that's not dangerous?

 

Imposing laws and bans smacks of rank self interest on the part of politicians who want to be perceived as pro-environment. It's just more wasted time and taxpayer dollars. Honestly, I don't know what we pay these people for any more. They don't create solutions to problems, they follow polls and do what they think makes them look good to the public.

agreed, Daniel -

 

Banning the incandescent is a bad way of forcing the issue. What's needed is better

marketing ( No! They're not green anymore! Save money on your energy bill! ), and more

conventional design ( make them look like regular bulbs ).

Here in Gainesville, Florida ( GO GATORS ) the local power utility ( Gainesville Regional

Utilities - GRU ) is running a program to partially subsidize the cost of the bulbs - cutting

the price of a pack of four bulbs in half. That may also be a way to help promote the

bulbs as well.

we use the CFL as they are convenient and seem to give adequets good light. as seniors, here in PA we are in a program that gives us a fixed electric rate, about 1/3 off the real usage.

 

despite that, we still use cfl for general lighting under $3.00 for sylvania and under a dollar for " dollar store" bluish cf we used for night lights. I am anxious to see when led bulbs become available, more light and longer life.

I am going to them on a replacement basis and the daylight ones are just fine. A bit harsh compared to the Reveal bulbs we were using but not bad at all.

In 1926 "Edison" bulbs didn't have rounded ends, the had little pointy things sticking out on the end.

Compact fluorescents are usually death to AM and shortwave radio reception in the general area. The solid state ballasts generate horrible AM noise. Why the FCC lets them ship them I don't understand.

 

Also, one of the suckers made a serious attempt to burn my house down. No way am I taking that risk again.

 

Not to mention how hideous they look in 1926 vintage bare-bulb fixtures.

How can they call this an environmental move when each one is putting more mercury into the home.

<i>Compact fluorescents are usually death to AM</i><p>

 

That's a positive thing, isn't it?

Can anyone explain how the level of mercury in CF bulbs is deemed acceptable enough that everyone is encouraged to switch to these bulbs and just throw them away when used up, but the environment could not withstand the threat posed by tiny mercury camera batteries?