Uncle Frank
(K=1642) - Comment Date 4/6/2003
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I hadn't heard of them until you mentioned them. Steady state lighting is much easier to handle than strobes. With the ability of digital cameras to manually white balance, though, I don't see the need for anything specialized/expensive. What am I missing?
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Betsy Hern
(K=12872) - Comment Date 4/7/2003
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Here are some thoughts I've collected on different lighting setups for digital photography, don't know if this helps in this situation. At the place where I work we use stobes (halogen) with our Nikon digicam w/Kodak pro back. We shoot all day, small product shots (art supplies) and like the fact that the light source can be triggered as needed, not on all the time. I'd say though that if you are shooting in a less than pro setup that strobe is not necessary.
I believe that the photographer who is moving to digital photography from traditional medium format, large format or even 35mm studio photography, has to ask him/herself the question of what kind of lighting to use: HMI, tungsten, or electronic flash?
Most of the high end digital camera?s white balance settings let you shoot under almost any light. You don't need expensive and complex strobes to get good results. You can use simple and inexpensive tungsten, quartz, or fluorescent bulbs with reflectors. Not only are the results as good, but with the lights on all of the time, you can see the effect they are having as you arrange your setup.
But, if you are setting up a professional digital studio and anticipate shooting many product shots, strobes may be the way to go if you can control their intensity. The decision to select strobe vs. continuous flood lighting for product photography might be based on object size. The light produced by common studio strobes is much brighter than flood lighting and can cover a much wider area. When using strobes in confined spaces it can be difficult to control the light level and strobes often can be too bright for most digital cameras.
Flood lighting works for most setups including portraiture. Flood lighting is easier to use because you can see in the view finder/LCD display exactly what your image will look like. Strobe lighting requires more trial and error setup corrections and can be frustrating, but once you come up with the right formula and leave the setup static, it's doable. Color balance is not much of a concern with digital cameras because of their sophisticated "automatic color balance" settings which automatically compensate for the color temperature of the studio light. Remember to set your digital camera's white balance to "interior" or "incandescent" setting if available.
Strobe lighting may wash out color, in some digital cameras. Also, triggering strobe lights with digital cameras can be tricky. Most digital cameras do not provide a trigger output for strobe lights but depend on their "built in" strobe units. Strobes are available for digital cameras with a "hot shoe" or a "PC" connector but they must have a PC trigger input. Strobe lights require a trigger circuit and most digital cameras don't provide these connections, and hot shoe adapters are available for some digicams.
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Uncle Frank
(K=1642) - Comment Date 4/8/2003
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Wonderful insights from a professional, Betsy. I've had some excellent results from using artificial light and manually white balancing. I think manual wb is a feature most amateur digital users don't attempt because it seems so complicated, but it's really pretty simple. I use a small piece of "black" foam core board as the sample, and place it in the same light that will illuminate the subject. My cp995 takes care of all the rest :-). The hardest part of the process is to remember to reset wb to [auto] afterwards.
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Nejat Talas
(K=15) - Comment Date 4/21/2003
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I always prefer artificial light...
here are 2 examples
http://www.usefilm.com/showphoto.php?id=113812
this one is shot on film with flo lights...
and..
http://www.usefilm.com/showphoto.php?id=27833
this one is digital with flo setup...
I hope it helps..
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Alvin Mak
(K=1737) - Comment Date 11/8/2005
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I am considering a lighting system for my home as well. I don't know anyone to ask but find 5500k compact flourescent bulbs on the internet. How do these bulbs compare to the usual indoor lighting systems? What are the cons?
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Helen Bach
(K=2331) - Comment Date 11/8/2005
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About using fluorescents with digital cameras:
Remember that light from a fluorescent lamp (often called a 'florrie') does not have a smooth distribution over the spectrum. They have sharp spikes in the spectrum. Because these are local spikes, they cannot be fully corrected for by doing a white balance, so the colour rendering will never be as accurate as that from smooth-spectrum (eg incandescent) sources. The degree of acceptability of the colour rendering is down to personal judgement and taste, of course. There are times when you might want to show things in light with fluorescent character - the picture of Anna in my portfolio is an example in which the character of the location has been kept.
Lamps with high CRI (colour rendering index above 90), such as those intended for digital and film photography, have comparatively small spikes in their spectrum which are generally unnoticeable in photographs. When I'm doing portraits and want the most accurate skin tones, I avoid all but high-CRI florries whether I'm using digital or film.
I've made a few other posts about the use of florries, if anybody wants to read them. There are some comments in there about the compact florries intended for photography.
Best,
Helen
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