Capturing incredible shots requires more than a great camera. Good lighting not only adds depth and dimension to your shots, it can make a film look like a million bucks. If you’re looking for a lighting package for rent in Miami, where do you start?
Light Sources
They come in all shapes, sizes and properties and, depending on your needs and budget, can include LED, tungsten, fluorescent, and HMIs. Use them with picks, gels, and stands to get the right highlighting, colors, and angles your shots call for.
Each fixture, bulb, lens, and reflector is designed to create a specific beam. You can control these beams to create needed brightness, evenness, softness, punch, and focusability. Each lighting fixture you choose has its own distinct advantages, and there are tricks to using them.
What You Need in Your Lighting Kit
Before you choose your rental lighting package it helps to understand the type of light source it employs and what each does:
Tungsten
Tungsten incandescent bulbs contain a tungsten filament that the electric current makes incandescent. In older bulbs, the filament gradually evaporates and lines the inside of the bulb, making it darker and lowering its color temperature. A cleaning agent was often used in large 10K lamps to get rid of this blackening.
Quartz halogen bulbs were designed to get around this problem. They have a special regenerative element that prevents these deposits and instead carries the evaporated tungsten back to the filament for reuse. This “halogen cycle,” which requires that a high temperature be maintained inside the globe, greatly increases bulb life. Quartz can easily withstand this high temp while retaining a steady color temperature and quieter operation than older bulbs.
From 5Ks to focus floods, Moving Picture Rental has a wide range of Arri tungsten lights available for your shoot. The Fresnel series is perfect for when lightweight spotlights are called for or where grid height is a problem. And the focus floods are well-built, powerful light sources that are ideal for field production, electronic news gathering, and fast turnaround production use.
HMIs
HMIs (hydrargyrum medium arc-length iodides) are a highly efficient source of daylight-balanced light of approximately 5600K to 6000K. Unlike tungsten fixtures, there’s no filament. HMIs produce about 4x as much light as tungsten lights of the same wattage. As a result, they operate at a somewhat cooler temp. So, for example, if you want to match the color temp of an HMI with a tungsten lamp, you’ll need to add a blue filter in front of it.
We offer a range of ARRI Fresnel and par fixtures for rent. Five to eight times more efficient than their tungsten counterparts, these lights are an excellent choice for lighting interior rooms through a window or as supplemental lighting on outdoor shoots.
Fluorescent lights
Fluorescent lights historically had a couple big drawbacks. First, color reproduction was poor because the tubes produced a partial spectrum light with a green spike. Also, to say there was a flicker problem is an understatement. Those issues were solved with full-spectrum tubes and crystal-sync motors for cameras coupled with high-frequency light ballasts.
Cinematographers have a lot to love about fluorescents:
- They’re lightweight.
- They put out soft, controllable light that creates a pleasing eye light while wrapping around objects. DP Kris Kachikis (Why Him?; American Son) used them extensively while shooting Christopher Guest’s Mascots for Netflix to make sure the set was evenly lit from all directions to accommodate the director’s improvisational style of shooting.
- Used as a soft lighting instrument.
MPR’s line of Kino Flo fluorescent lighting has become a staple of South Florida productions. For example, the Parabeam 400, Diva-Lite 400, 2ft Four-Bank, and 4ft Four Bank are especially popular for documentary shoots or other productions that require quick interviews.
LED
LED (light emitting diode) panels are a versatile lighting tool that are simple in appearance but mighty in execution. They’re able to handle numerous lighting challenges in practically any setting. In use there’s virtually no heat generation, meaning they can be handheld. Additionally, you can place them close to talent without making them uncomfortable.
Today’s LEDs are extremely capable of needed output and spectrally-consistent spread. And their low power, low heat properties means you save both on needed labor and on wire compared to non-LED big lights like HMIs.
At MPR we offer 4 LitePanel options including the 1×1 daylight flood, miniplus flood, 1×1 bi-color panel, and soft bi-color panel. The panels’ portability and 5600K color temp make them ideal for “man-on-the-street” interviews and the kits include portable lightweight stands and soft carrying cases.
Let the Light Shine
Moving Picture Rental provides the most up-to-date professional film and video lighting rentals in all of Miami. Kino Flo, ARRI Tungsten, ARRIMax HMIs, LED, Dedolights, Parcans, and Jokers, we’ve got it all!
To learn more about all our lighting packages for rent in Miami and Ft. Lauderdale, or any of our other South Florida production services, call us today at 305.522.1361 or email us at info@movingpicture.com.