Portable Lighting for Outdoor Locations

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John
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Hi guys

Not sure this is the correct place to post but lets give it a go.

We've been asked to attend a village carnival to produce printed t-shirts.

The idea is that we'd use a chroma key green backdrop, stand or sit the subject in front and use Photokey Pro to add backgrounds and overlays. The final artwork will be printed on white t-shirts using our NeoFlex textile printer. It really for a bit of fun.

The only thing I don't have is the lighting! I know I can purchase some soft-box lights etc but, if mains power isn't available in the power we need, what are the alternatives? I've looked at some of the LED photo-lighting panels that cost near on £300. These would be ideal as the power consumption is low, but the price is a bit steep and I don't know whether they stack up well against more traditional lighting.

There are of course 30w LED floods but am I right in thinking that these wouldn't work for photography?

Any help, advice would be gratefully received.

Cheers

john
 
It really depends if this is a one off or if you're planning similar in the future.

The cheapest option is speedlights, some Yongnuo's with triggers and external battery packs. They'll produce enough power inside a largish softbox and shouldn't be too much hassle.

Next up are bare bulb flash like the Lencarta Atom (other brands are available), they'll light modifiers better, produce more light but cost a bit more

Then there's battery powered studio heads, they'll take standard modifiers without messing around with brackets, Lencarta Safari would be ideal, other makes are available.

Mix and match from the above, I'd recommend a Safari in a large softbox, with a flashgun as a hairlight and maybe another to add a touch of fill through a brolly (neither of those things will be hurt by the flashguns limitations) You could make do with less, budget dependant.

I personally wouldn't go for LED lights for this, they're not particularly bright and they're likely to run out of steam and leave you up the creek.
 
If mains power isn't available then I presume that you're going to be outside? If so, you'll need more power than if you were doing it inside.

Whilst Photokey is a very good product, you'll find it much easier if you get your lighting right, so larger soft boxes would help, and in turn that means bare bulb or studio heads. It's not impossible to do it with speed lights, just harder.
 
Rent a set of Elinchrom Quadras and an octabox and do it properly.
 
Another option is a battery power pack and regular studio heads. Innovatronix or Godox - hire them from TheFlashCentre.

The key question is how much light you need, eg indoors or outdoors, though most forms of continuous light will struggle even indoors.
 
Thanks guys, all very interesting reading :)

I've just fitted a 4Kw inverter in my motorhome. I wouldn't and couldn't imagine pulling 2Kw let alone 4, but I guess a few 100 watts might be okay. I have 2 x 200 watt solar panels on the roof so all's not lost.

If I could run lighting at a minimal power consumption, then that might be an answer - hence why I mentioned LED. As said, I have seen panels with 100's of LED advertised for photography use but expensive and I remain to be convinced that they work. If I did splash out on them I could always use them back at the shop.

What are the power requirements of the lighting suggestions above? I also have a 2Kw silent generator stashed away somewhere but I'd probably need most of that to power the printer & heatpress.
 
Please forget continuous lighting when it comes to supplementing, let alone overpowering, daylight. The power output of even the most powerful LED lighting is insignificant when compared to daylight.

That's why people use flash, and the minimum usable power, for most people in most situations for most of the time, is 600Ws - forget anything less than this if the sun's out.
 
datasafe said:
What are the power requirements of the lighting suggestions above? .
Click to expand...

I don't know about the Lencarta kit, but I love my Quadras for this sort of thing because I can run them off the battery pack or, if there's a chance of running a lead to where I'm working, I can plug in the charger and charge/shoot simultaneously. It's a really good solution for when you're not sure if you're going to be able to use power at any given location and because you're just charging a battery with a wall-wart, the drain isn't that much through a 240v 13A socket. You could probably manage that through your motorhome's inverter quite easily.

Quadras max out at 400W/s, but to be fair, unless you're doing your thing in bright daylight, you'll be absolutely fine. If you're able to locate in a tent or a bit of shade or something, so much the better.
 
datasafe said:
Thanks guys, all very interesting reading :)

I've just fitted a 4Kw inverter in my motorhome. I wouldn't and couldn't imagine pulling 2Kw let alone 4, but I guess a few 100 watts might be okay. I have 2 x 200 watt solar panels on the roof so all's not lost.

If I could run lighting at a minimal power consumption, then that might be an answer - hence why I mentioned LED. As said, I have seen panels with 100's of LED advertised for photography use but expensive and I remain to be convinced that they work. If I did splash out on them I could always use them back at the shop.

What are the power requirements of the lighting suggestions above? I also have a 2Kw silent generator stashed away somewhere but I'd probably need most of that to power the printer & heatpress.
Click to expand...

Word of warning if you're thinking of plugging a normal studio head into a generator or other basic inverter. I'm no expert on this, but know that many flash heads are very sensitive to a pure sine-wave supply and can suffer terminal damage. Studio heads only draw significant power when recharging of course, but I don't think it's massive - like a few hundred watts, plus modelling lamp. Check the specs.

From what you've said, the safest option and covering all bases would seem to be battery-pack powered flash, like the Eli Quadra or Lencarta Safari. Check hire options, eg TheFlashCentre. Stay out of the sun through, even open shade will make a huge difference. Forget continuous light though, it's mostly feeble and you'll need to push the ISO even in a darkened studio environment.
 
HoppyUK said:
Word of warning if you're thinking of plugging a normal studio head into a generator or other basic inverter. I'm no expert on this, but know that many flash heads are very sensitive to a pure sine-wave supply and can suffer terminal damage. Studio heads only draw significant power when recharging of course, but I don't think it's massive - like a few hundred watts, plus modelling lamp. Check the specs.

From what you've said, the safest option and covering all bases would seem to be battery-pack powered flash, like the Eli Quadra or Lencarta Safari. Check hire options, eg TheFlashCentre. Stay out of the sun through, even open shade will make a huge difference. Forget continuous light though, it's mostly feeble and you'll need to push the ISO even in a darkened studio environment.
Click to expand...
Spot on.
Plugging MODERN flash heads into an ordinary generator will kill them very dead - and by modern, I mean anything produced after about the mid 90's. The current crop, or at least from major manufacturers, are even more sensitive.

Of course, there are always going to be people who say that they've done it themselves without problems, but maybe they were just very lucky, or maybe they had very old, low tech flash heads.
 
Having used studio heads attached to a generator I can echo Richards warning, plus add another.

When the heads recharge they pull a lot of power very quickly. Even if you've got a powerfull genny (mine is 2KW recharging 2 x 400w heads set to about 1/4 power at the time), the drain on the genny causes power fluctuations in very sensitive equipment that is being powered by the genny.

As an example, when I was shooting with this I had a laptop and a router plugged in, sending the images wirelessly. It took me ages to work out that when the lights popped the router reset itself thus dropping the connection.

By far the simplest way to do this is to go for pack lighting. Forget continuous lighting if you're outdoors

I use the Lencarta Safari and it's ideal.

Addendum following Garry's post.. when I did this I used Elinchrom EL500 heads which were designed and built 20 years ago.
 
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