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Lighting a Mirror Balll


partyadz

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Hi all

 

Looking to light a 50 cm in a marquee.

 

Any opinions on best thing to light it with?

 

Have either traditional pin spots or Source 4 575 26 deg, or a Source 4 Junior Zoom available.

 

Alternatively, has anyone experienced use of the LED Pinspots?

 

Cheers

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Any opinions...

Yes.

 

Have either traditional pin spots...

Yes.

 

...or Source 4 575 26 deg

Too wide. Any further than 1m away and your spot will spill over the edges.

 

...or a Source 4 Junior Zoom available.

See above

 

Alternatively, has anyone experienced use of the LED Pinspots?

Too dim.

 

My favourite...

 

post-207-0-79341200-1305567502_thumb.jpg

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I always use a source 4 with an iris.

Trouble with an iris is that it throws away light. Shrink a beam to half its original diameter (=a quarter of the area) and you waste three-quarters of your light or wattage. So a 750W S4 becomes no brighter than a 100W unit with no iris.

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:rolleyes: Hi There, I use a 1w led pinspot,absolutely brilliant(excuse the pun).I was a bit sceptical at first but in use it proved what a useful little lantern it is.It even came with a choice of two lenses,definately the way to go.If memory serves, it cost £40 approx.Hope this helps,regards Roy.
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In our theatre I use 2kW ADB 13°-36° ellipsoidals with an iris.

 

Used it for different mirror balls from 50cm to 1.2m

At least two and sometimes 3 or 4 (depending on the gel)

 

The beams realy punch trough the haze and all the other beams with that much power.

The big advantage to pinspots in my opinion is that you can hang the light in a range from 5 to 10m away and perfectly light the complete diameter of the ball to make as much beams as possible and cut all the spill light away perfectly.

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The other thing to remember with mirror balls is that for the best effect you want as narrow a beam angle as possible to start with. That's a 'narrow beam angle' not a 'narrow beam'.

 

For example, a beam which is diverging at 30 degrees, even if focussed to just cover the ball, will continue to diverge at 30 degrees once it's been reflected.

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Brian - not one to quibble with your maths, but ... a 750W Source 4 is exactly the same brightness as a severely shuttered down one. The light level at the middle of the beam doesn't change.

Agreed. What I was trying to get over, badly, was that shuttering down a lantern reduces the total amount of light coming out of the front. Given the choice it's better to either move the lantern closer or to use a narrower angle unit.

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In our theatre I use 2kW ADB 13°-36° ellipsoidals with an iris.

 

Agreed! Great for a theatre, but I dont think you want to be lumping a 2K ADB up in a Marquee.

 

Personally, I use Source 4's with the most narrow lens or an iris.

 

If your feeling really posh, you could use a Clay-Paky Sharpy B-) They are fantastic for mirror balls!

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Brian - not one to quibble with your maths, but ... a 750W Source 4 is exactly the same brightness as a severely shuttered down one. The light level at the middle of the beam doesn't change.

Agreed. What I was trying to get over, badly, was that shuttering down a lantern reduces the total amount of light coming out of the front. Given the choice it's better to either move the lantern closer or to use a narrower angle unit.

 

A pinspot is by far the best solution for lighting a 50cm mirrorball as per the OP's situation. However when lighting a 200cm mirrorball from a throw distance of 25 metres I would say there is no better solution than a source four with an iris in. Unless of course you have moving heads to use! <_<

 

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/9103/mirrorballv.jpg

 

Uploaded with ImageShack.us

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When stuck with no other option (don't ask!) I used a pair of ancient Selecon 1kw PCs, spotted down as far as they would go - admittedly they were hanging pretty close to the mirrorball, but the end result was fantastic - far better than I had expected!
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