Continuous lighting

[Jiffy]

Hi, I've been stepping more and more into studio lighting recently and thought about getting my own small set up. I really love continuous lighting but being fairly new to it I am curious are there any tips anyone could give me, or advice. Or any links to something to watch or read. It's hard trying to cut through what's good and what's not so I thought I'd come and ask people directly. Thank you in advance.

Graham

 

[Phil V]

The simple answer: If it's less than £500 it's probably crap, if it's more than £500 it might be alright but flash is better value.

That might sound facetious, but after another 20 answers on this thread that'll be the conclusion.

We could cut to the chase if you told us which products are on your shortlist.

 

[Nionyn]

Yep, what Phil said.
If you only intend photographing products or still life continuous lighting would be fine.
If there's even the slightest chance that you'll be photographing children or animals get a flash system, not continuous.
If you're going to be photographing adults with a continuous system they're going to need to stay fairly still.

I appreciate the appeal of the WYSIWYG aspect of continuous lighting, but for reasonably short shutter speeds at reasonably low ISO and a range of apertures they're going to need to be horribly and uncomfortably bright for people, and you'd need to put your camera on a tripod for lower light levels for static subjects.
There are reasons that most photographers still use flash.


19 to go...

 

[Jiffy]

I don't really have any products on my list. My list is still being constructed shall we say.
What about a combination of flash and continueous? Apologies if that sounds daft. But is that something that people do?
It was more geared towards portraits of adults. I use flash all the way with kids and pets.

 

[Nionyn]

What about a combination of flash and continueous? Apologies if that sounds daft. But is that something that people do?

I moderate the Strobist group on Flickr and, as a result, see a huge number of flash-lit photos (and kick a large number of non-flash-lit photos...). Over the past year or so I've seen quite a lot of photos (from amateur photographers) combining flash with continuous sources. These are very occasionally TH, occasionally fluorescents but more often nowadays small-panel LEDs. They work, but the continuous sources are nearly always used as extra lights for added colour from the sides, or for hair lights, or for lighting the backgrounds, or whatever - never, as far as I can remember, as the main source of light.

To my mind combining flash with continuous lighting in a studio setting when photographing people is something that makes sense only if those specific lights are all you have. That is, if you basically have no choice.
To an appreciable extent you lose many of the benefits of using flash (stopping action, low ISO, consistent and accurate colour rendering, choice of modifiers, huge range of variable power, not blinding your subjects), and you also lose the benefits (such as they are) of using continuous sources (basically just WYSIWYG).

From what you say it seems that you are quite familiar with using flash. Why, exactly, do you want to use continuous sources? Is there anything about them that would work in your favour apart from WYSIWYG?

18 to go... ;-)

 

[Phil V]

I suppose it's that equipment question I find frustrating...
'I want to buy xxx, will it work to do yyy ' and its mate 'I've just bought xxx and can't work out what to do next, it doesn't seem to yyy '.

The important issue is the "yyy" here, like everything else in life; don't start with the solution and work back to the problem.

What yyy is it that you want to achieve? What is it about xxx that leads you to think it's the solution to your problems?

As above, continuous has colour issues and power issues compared to flash, for me, there has to be a compelling reason to accept those limitations.

 

[HoppyUK]

I use fluorescents for a lot of my work that needs continuous light, but wouldn't recommend them for general studio work. The ones I have are Lencarta Quad Lites, and they're as bright as they come at the affordable end with 4x 105W bulbs. The 80cm softbox is a decent size, but brightness is borderline for portraits - they give 1/125sec at f/5.6 ISO400 at 1.0m distance.

Colour is okay for non-critical work, but don't mix brands or bulbs - they can be alarmingly different. The choice of lighting modifiers is very restricted and another thing is they're a right PITA to pack away with those huge bulbs that need careful storage.

For portraits and general stuff, flash is way better and no more expensive. For high quality basic portraits on a budget, Lencarta Smartflash-2, white umbrella*, white/silver reflector, stand. That's about £150 I think and a great way to start

*Umbrellas are excellent - great light, cheap, very easy to put up/down, and make better use of smaller working areas than softboxes.

 

[Jiffy]

I moderate the Strobist group on Flickr and, as a result, see a huge number of flash-lit photos (and kick a large number of non-flash-lit photos...). Over the past year or so I've seen quite a lot of photos (from amateur photographers) combining flash with continuous sources. These are very occasionally TH, occasionally fluorescents but more often nowadays small-panel LEDs. They work, but the continuous sources are nearly always used as extra lights for added colour from the sides, or for hair lights, or for lighting the backgrounds, or whatever - never, as far as I can remember, as the main source of light.

To my mind combining flash with continuous lighting in a studio setting when photographing people is something that makes sense only if those specific lights are all you have. That is, if you basically have no choice.
To an appreciable extent you lose many of the benefits of using flash (stopping action, low ISO, consistent and accurate colour rendering, choice of modifiers, huge range of variable power, not blinding your subjects), and you also lose the benefits (such as they are) of using continuous sources (basically just WYSIWYG).

From what you say it seems that you are quite familiar with using flash. Why, exactly, do you want to use continuous sources? Is there anything about them that would work in your favour apart from WYSIWYG?

18 to go... ;-)

Thank you, that's explained things to me perfectly. I'm still learning about lighting, especially in regards to a controlled scenario or even semi controlled. I'm not sure why it interests me so much, just looking at other ideas and other avenues to be honest. And I'm going to sound like a total fool but what is WYSIWYG?

Lighting the hair with continuous lighting is a great idea. Seems so simple now but studio stuff is something I'm only venturing into now, so I'm a bit behind.

Thanks again for taking the time to explain things, it has really helped.

 

[Jiffy]

I suppose it's that equipment question I find frustrating...
'I want to buy xxx, will it work to do yyy ' and its mate 'I've just bought xxx and can't work out what to do next, it doesn't seem to yyy '.

The important issue is the "yyy" here, like everything else in life; don't start with the solution and work back to the problem.

What yyy is it that you want to achieve? What is it about xxx that leads you to think it's the solution to your problems?

As above, continuous has colour issues and power issues compared to flash, for me, there has to be a compelling reason to accept those limitations.

I get what you're saying, but in all honesty it was more out of curiosity, something different to look into. I understand the limitations more now. Continuous lighting has just fascinated me, not really sure why exactly. Maybe I just want to be difficult and try and over come the problems, even if they are problems that I don't have to tolerate.

 

[sunnyside_up]

I think there's a time and a place for continuous lighting - and portraits isn't generally one of them... generally (in my opinion anyway). I know of a company that has been trying to mix things up a bit and trying to get LED's more and more into the portrait side of things. And the model's I've spoken to that were used all said the same thing - the're really bright, and uncomfortable, ... but they're professionals, they work around it and they suck it up. I wouldn't want to ask your average client to 'suck it up'.

I don't use continuous ever for portraits. But I will use my little Lumie's or a Lykos for some accent or fill when I'm doing still life.

 

[Phil V]

I get what you're saying, but in all honesty it was more out of curiosity, something different to look into. I understand the limitations more now. Continuous lighting has just fascinated me, not really sure why exactly. Maybe I just want to be difficult and try and over come the problems, even if they are problems that I don't have to tolerate.

There are some trendy products that might be worth trying, but as Beth says, the idea of squinting into a bright light is a bit troublesome. They're niche products, and if you want to work in that niche you can create interesting images.

 

[HoppyUK]

One thing I really like about continuous lights for portraits, is the large iris showing the colour of the eyes. Check out the leading head shot photographers, eg Peter Hurley https://peterhurley.com/photography/womens-headshots The theory that a large, dark pupil is something that we naturally find attractive is, IMHO, cobblers.

You can get some way towards a large iris and smaller pupil with flash by closer positioning of the key light, and the modelling lamp on full power.

 

[Graham W]

Thank you, that's explained things to me perfectly. I'm still learning about lighting, especially in regards to a controlled scenario or even semi controlled. I'm not sure why it interests me so much, just looking at other ideas and other avenues to be honest. And I'm going to sound like a total fool but what is WYSIWYG?

Lighting the hair with continuous lighting is a great idea. Seems so simple now but studio stuff is something I'm only venturing into now, so I'm a bit behind.

Thanks again for taking the time to explain things, it has really helped.

WYSIWYG = What You See Is What You Get.