Arri L5/L7/L10-C Color LED Fresnel

[Mark M]

I've been eyeing this since their L7 came out a couple years ago and recently picked up an L5-C to test the waters with.

Hoping to learn about other's experience with these on Red too. In the little research I've done, seems like they aren't quite as punchy as advertised, which I half expected. But assume the recently announced L10-C will be a nice/bright solution. CRI is advertised at 95+. Does anyone notice color limitations with these compared to 100 CRI sources?

Also curious if there's a 'better' alternate recommendation for low power draw / low heat / daylight balanced / tunable

Thanks!

 

[Michael Tiemann]

The L7-C had enabled me to keep my WB at 5000K without blowing out my power budget on gelled-down halogens. I use them mostly for key lights. I use a Joker Bug 800 when I need real power (such as diffuse fill over a larger area, for example). The color feature is all well and good, but I have a whole bunch of ETC Source4 and ETC Desire instruments that also give me color, so I never really use the color feature from the L7-C. If I bought an L10, I'd get the brightest, most daylight balanced one I could find and call it good. I'd use other instruments for colors (so as not to dumb-down the L10).

 

[Martin Stevens]

Hello Mark M,

Have you looked at the Mole Richardson Daylight LED Fresnels?

There are very impressive.

 

[Mark M]

Thanks guys. I picked up the L-5 specifically to use on a very small set first to see how I like it.
The Joker Bug 800 looks pretty sweet for a nice strong fill, and good points about the colors Michael.

Martin, I didn't give the Mole Richardson LED Fresnels much thought because of the listed 90 CRI.
I had some not-so-great experiences with a few 80-90 CRI fluorescents a few years ago but maybe I'm putting too much stake in the CRI now.

 

[Stacey Spears]

I have both the L7-C and L5-C. Wish the L7-C could put out more light, especially with a soft box on it. I use the 7 as the key light and 5 as the fill light for documentary work. The L10 is BIG, too big for my doc work. I am looking into getting the new Arri SkyPanel (S30) when it comes out for the key light.

Don't trust the color temp and tint settings on the side. They don't match what they say and they don't match each other at the same settings. With a colorimeter, you can easily match them. Don't want to single them out and say they are the only ones that don't match what they say. I am not sure any lights match what they claim. The Arri lights are full spectrum, which is nice.

You can see the results of the light quality from TLCI-2012 here. Of course, TLCI is mostly tested using a simulated 3-chip camera. Art's article raises some concerns on TLCI with single chip CMOS cameras. With that said, TLCI is still better than CRI when it comes to light quality.

 

[Mark M]

Thanks Stacey. Wasn't sure how accurate the color tuning was and that's pretty important. And glad to see the daylight L5-C clocked in at 95 CRI according to the link. Do you happen to know what the 'd' column represents in their chart (-.8 for LC-5)? I was surprised how large the 5 was when it arrived, so the L10 must be huge!

 

[Stacey Spears]

I started with the L7, so the L5 seems small to me. I thought the size difference between 5 and 7 is what the 10 would have been. It is a 10 instead of a 9, so maybe that is why it looks so HUGE to me.

I should qualify the color temp comment. I tried an experiment by lighting a gray card and using the auto white balance in the Dragon. I kept adjusting until almost no color and tint changed from the default 5600 and 0 in camera. I think that resulted in something like 6500 kelvin on the side of the light with -.7 or something for tint. It was done about a year ago, so I don't recall the exact numbers. The idea was to adjust the light so that no color / tint was used. Not sure what I was hoping to get.

Either way, I really do like the L7 and L5. I was planning to get the L10 until I saw it in person. Then I was planning to get another L7 until I saw the S60/S30. Since they are softer by default than the L5/7, I thought it would make a nice new key light. Then I can use the softbox on the L7 for the fill light. Then the L5 can light up the back wall, with a gobo pattern. I currently have a Litepanels SolaENG for hair light. I think I will replace it with a Fiilix P180E light for the hair light.

I don't recall what the d is. Here is a NAB interview with Alan, the creator of TLCI-2012.

 

[Rick Lang]

Stacey, the 'd' value (apparently required by CIE) on the TLCI charts is a measure of the difference of the measured chroma under the light being tested from the ideal value. In a nutshell, a value of 0 such as found in an ARRI 650 fresnel is spot on and a value greater than 1 indicates the colours are not very reliable. Paraphrasing what was explained in the video you linked to in your post.