Painting with Light

Hello everyone,

Please forgive me if something similar has been asked before, but I couldn't find anything in the search.

I'm after a torch that's good for photography & painting with light. So far, I have used a standard 2AA Maglite (Halogen, not LED) but I'd like to upgrade to something stronger.

These are the "must-haves":
- rechargeable battery, ideally AA (although a dedicated charger for Lithium would be acceptable)
- small size
- adjustable focus

What would be "nice to have":
- adjustable strength ("low power" mode for small range/longer use)


What would you recommend?
I've been thinking about the Surefire L7, but two things put me off: it's pre-focused and the charger is rater huge. Two or three AA batteries (NiMH) would be ideal, but I need something stronger than the Halogen MagLite.

BTW: DOes anyone know how many lumen the 2AA Halogen Maglite has?

Thanks a lot!!

CPixie

The minimag has around 9-10 lumen out the front on fresh batteries.

Focusing usually doesn't work too well, it usually leaves you with rings and holes.

How about a multi output level LED light like the Fenix L2D-CE Q5?(8% off coupon at Fenix Store is "CPF8") The Q5 version is more then 15 times brighter on turbo(150 something lumen on turbo including losses, low is around the same output as the minimag).

The current generation LEDs(Cree XR-E P4-R2 bin, Seoul P4 U-bin, Luxeon Rebel 100) are twice or more efficient then the previous generation(Luxeon I, III, V, and K2). That means for the same power, the newer ones have twice or more output, that is how a 2AA light like the L2D-CE can have the same or more output then the Surefire L7(Smaller size is also a plus, but quality goes to the Surefire).

But LEDs have much less red then an incandescent, so everything will seem different. Read the second half of this thread for more info.

Price range?
Output?
Size?

:welcome:

I suggest an incan for light painting, led's do not have enough different colors in them to get accurate colors in the photo.

You want a good quality WHITE incan light, perhaps Xenon or such. Fairly floody is best unless your subject is fairly far away I suppose.

I've done light painting in the past, using a mix of manual camera flash from different angles and flashlights, and LED's just leave weird looking colours. I'm not picky enough to not use LEDs for everything I do in normal use, but something like this I would use an incan.

It would be a good idea to use a grey card to get a good white balance, as always.

i use this technique time to time
i find a tight spot is useful for this, as i can illuminate only my subject
i use my surefire m4

here is one, tripod mounted, around dusk, only cropped and resized
8sec exposure, and i painted the car with light from the m4 during the whole exposure



and here is what it looks like if i meter only using natural light (30 sec exposure same apeture)

During my photographic career in the RNZAF we used this a few times, I sure wish I knew then what I know about torches now!

LEDs wont cut it, they will have a rather odd colour cast that will be tricky to cope with either using the custom WB or in Photoshop.

Forget focusable! Lights that are focusable generally just mean they go from a decent beam to a really crap one full of holes. If you need to go from focused beam to a flood beam, get a diffuser.

I'd suggest an incan, and I'd suggest a Surefire G3 with a P90. You can use 17500 Li-ion rechargeables (get them from AW in the dealer section here) with this light. Get a FM34 'Beam shaper' (what SF call a diffuser) and you'll be set.

If you were considering the L7, you'll be happy with the G3's price and size (both quite a bit less than the L7).

seems I got that title wrong

thought You mean something like this here:


stolen from mtb-news.de

Genious!
PS: he used a Fenix

How on Earth did he manage to move the flashlight like that during what must have been a pretty long exposure without also photographing a horrible blurry mess of himself?

Not sure of what you mean, but when I paint with light I use a Innova X5 / Nightcutter 5P with a 17670 cell. See the results in the below thread. I had no problem with colour tone as my digital camera has adjusted nicely.


https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/173449

@ fallingwater:
exactly what I also think

2 other pics:

new car:



together with 2 friends + his cat:



at least thats "painting" in very raw form


I asked him how he did it: dark spot, exposure of a few secs + flash, then move light quickly.
On where to be a line, off to move to next starting point
As he said, they did just a few ones and most worked good

Hello Yellow,

Those are great photographs!!!

Tom

yellow said:

@ fallingwater:
exactly what I also think

2 other pics:

new car:

together with 2 friends + his cat:

at least thats "painting" in very raw form


I asked him how he did it: dark spot, exposure of a few secs + flash, then move light quickly.
On where to be a line, off to move to next starting point
As he said, they did just a few ones and most worked good

Click to expand...

I wonder what can he draw if he has all 5 Led colors of the A2 + incan :naughty:.

I once saw an art program called SMart in CBBC where they had about 15-20 peoples holding various light (Mags, million CP lights, lanterns, 5mm LEDs cluster torchlights, and other plastic torchlights) covered with color plastic wrapping papers to draw a scenic nature view with rainbow, clouds, and etc. (forget much of the setting they use as I'm too busy looking at their lights! :sick2

Dan_GSR said:

i use this technique time to time
i find a tight spot is useful for this, as i can illuminate only my subject
i use my surefire m4

here is one, tripod mounted, around dusk, only cropped and resized
8sec exposure, and i painted the car with light from the m4 during the whole exposure

and here is what it looks like if i meter only using natural light (30 sec exposure same apeture)

Click to expand...

Excellent shot. Very well done. Crisp and good color temp too. Did you have to set your WB to Tungsten?

I agree, this is anther area where incans do an excellent job. LEDs look very flat and cold, but when mixed with an incan, it may produce interesting results. By mixing I mean having the main light source be an incan and an LED as rim lighting or something. The two different color temps should render an interesting "cinematic" lighting effect which I'll have to try.

How long did it take to paint the car? What camera were you suing?

I know this technique is not easy. :twothumbs

AWB
i have the 1D II, which is very good at awb
the top picture you see is an 8 second exposure, i painted the car with my m4 during the whole exposure to get the colors to pop

basically my subject, the car is properly exposed
while the background is underexposed, giving it a mood of darkness
this also more accurately shows what it looks like to the naked eye

certainly LEDs can be used for this technique
only thing is, it should be your ONLY light source
if there is any ambient light, be it from the sun or incandescent lights
the leds tend to give an angry blue hue
mixed lighting is very diffcult to color balance
which is why i prefer to use my m4, it gives a slightly warmer tone, and is easier to match with ambient light

Hi Gunner12,

Thanks for the Fenix recommendation. This looks PERFECT for the job. I don't mind the colour balance – this can be adjusted in Photoshop, or by placing a colour correction filter (Lee or Roscoe) in front of the flashlight.

One question: I couldn't find out if the Fenix L2D is pre-focused or not. it would be nice if it can be hand focused – just to be a bit more precise with painting. (Same as a professional flashgun/speedlight has different zoom levels).

CPixie

none of the fenix lights have adjustable focus

CPixie said:

or by placing a colour correction filter (Lee or Roscoe) in front of the flashlight.

CPixie

Click to expand...

Actually you will probably find that this is not true. LEDs put out a very narrow spectrum of light, and as such correction filters will not work reliably with them.

I took this one time ago, I wanted to make the glowrings shine!



Used an ARC AAA to quickly paint the body


Pablo

LEDs have the full spectrum, just they have spikes in the blue and yellow wavelength. Look at this post for the spectrum VS and incans(The thread also has color charts, example). Each LED and Incan will have a slightly different spectrum, but that gives a pretty goo representation.

I don't know that much about painting and photographs(As in the job) so I'd leave the technical stuff to the people who know.

The Fenix has a fixed focus but I think you can focus it a bit by twisting the reflector part(first you will have to break the glue).

The kind of focus you are looking for would probably be an optic(As in a lens) because a defocused reflector will give you ugly rings and holes that will affect the picture.

The main problem isn't the color balance, it is the spikes in color spectrum.(Maybe you can decrease the blues and yellow in a picture editing software?)

yellow said:

seems I got that title wrong

thought You mean something like this here:

stolen from mtb-news.de

Genious!
PS: he used a Fenix

Click to expand...

Yellow, Those are nice pictures you posted.

When I read the topic name, that was what I was expecting.

There are similar pictures here.

There is an amazing video made from still photos here.

There was a post here a while back that had those links.

Regards,
Mark