Fluorescent lighting in studio

Greetings (and apologies for this not being directly camera related),

 

For a number of reasons I cannot use strobes, and have been thinking of switching

from 32k hotlights to 55k fluorescent lights in my

studio, primarily for portraits, although now and then for still-life/product type shots

with a 4x5 or 5x7.

 

Both Gyoury and Lowel make what appear to be very nice, if overpriced,

products. However it

would be possible to (diy) make a very similar, although not dimmable, set-up for

about a tenth of the price, using kits readily availble for aquarium-lighting, and the

same Osram 55watt 5300k bulbs which Lowel uses.

 

Has anyone out there used fluorescent lights in their studio? I am curious what sort of

exposures they are getting, how many total watts, and what equipment they are

using. Any reactions or

responses to use the of Fluorescent lighting in studio?

 

thanks in advance

Fluorescent lighting for still photo usage seems to be a growing

trend, but like anything else there are comprimises.

 

A single Kino-Flo 4x4 unit with all the bulbs on will give you F4 @

1/60 of a sec at four feet!!! They are dialed in at 5500K but really

come in a little cooler- so run tests first.

 

I know of several people who built "Kino-Flo" style lights, the

main problem seems to be the ballast. Everyone who did it

themselves, said if they had to do it again they would just buy

Kino-Flo's.

 

They still heat up, if course not as hot has hotlights and HMI

units but that is still there.

 

I actually have a Lowel Caselight that I would be interested in

selling, email off the list if you are interested. I thought I would

use it more often, but I almost never use it. I end up going for the

tota's or my elinchrom's.

 

The other problem, is they are very bulky, and awkward to use in

the studio. It is much easier to position a 1k Mole Richardson,

than a Kini-Flo, or other fluorescent unit. They are also much,

much more fragile than strobes or hotlights, but not as erratic as

HMI's.

 

Kino-Flo has great support, and are always upgrading their

units. If you send something into be repaired, they will

automatically upgrade your unit at no charge.

I won't be a whole lot of help but I did experiment with some aquarium lites and decided that even home built it was prohibitively expensive.

 

What I had was a 4-48"110 watt VHO on electronic ballast giving 440 watts of 6500K flouresent light. DIY wholesale cost about $250.00. I don't remember exactly but it was less effective light then one cheap Smith Victor quartz and even less than a Vivitar 283. I also decided that to get the same fstop I would get the same heat as quartz. Perhaps the commercially available units are different.

by the way, the dim feature on the lights is via turning off tubes,

not by cutting current. that would alter the color balance. just

letting you know in case you go the DYI route.

"by the way, the dim feature on the lights is via turning off tubes"

 

Only on some, not all units.

 

Kaiser makes 2 and 6 tube versions. The 6 tube are available with either a rheostat to dim

to 10% of full output continuously from 100% or with a full.half/quarter power switch. With

rheostat it dims without changing color temperature or turning off tubes. With the switch

it uses 6/4/2 tubes depending on the setting.

The 2 lamp version is available with rheostat or simply on/off switch. Again - with the

rheostat it does not turn off the tubes and it dims to 10%.

 

There are other systems from Europe that work the same.

 

So no, dimming does not mean that tubes are turned off.

Normal fluorescent lights flicker at 120 hz or so- can you use shutter speeds faster than 1/60 or so with them?