With High Efficiency and a More Continuous Color Spectrum, the Latest LEDs Are a Hit in Hollywood

In July, the inimitable product manager Ali Ahmadi from Litepanels was presenting the Sola 12 to a tough crowd at the Digital Cinema Society in Hollywood. A heckler suddenly stood up halfway through the presentation and demanded to know how robust the new LED Fresnel really was. After all, it’s manufactured in Chatsworth in the lowly San Fernando Valley—not in a fabled workshop on the outskirts of a great beer-drinking town in Bavaria.

So the Great Ali leaned over and pressed his considerable mass into the Sola 12, crashing it face-first to the floor. It wasn’t a loving thing to do, or a very scientific way to prove a point, but the point had to be made. And Ali is nothing if not the consummate showman.

So the 35 lb (15.8 kg) instrument took a massive header. And was it damaged?

You bet.

The Sola 12’s acrylic lens was cracked in two.  The lower retaining ear for the barndoor was sheared off at the base.

So Ali went to fire up the instrument.

And nothing happened. The light was kaput. Dead as a doornail.

Now what?

No doubt Ali was thinking about how fate had intervened in his life and taught him a lesson about humility. But then he tried the light again, and this time the Sola 12 shook off the mammoth blow and came back to life, its beam intense and undimmed by the lens slicing starkly through the astonished crowd. The hall erupted in cheers and applause. Wow!

So Ali made his point after all.

On an actual job, the plastic lens could have been easily reconstituted with a strip of clear packing tape and returned to service. The lopped-off ear could have been relocated on the Sola housing and an undamaged one moved to support the barndoor. Also keep in mind that, had a barndoor been installed in the first place, the Sola would likely not have suffered any damage at all—the barndoor louvers would have absorbed the bulk of the impact. Still, some damage was incurred and this is worth bearing in mind.

As a cinematographer for over 35 years, I understand the reluctance of many professionals to embrace new products. After all, we’ve done things one way for so long it makes sense and seems much safer to our careers and financial well-being to continue on the same old path. The recalcitrance is especially understandable when it comes to lighting and grip, a realm that changed little through cinema’s first 100 years.

Today, Ali’s attempt at showmanship notwithstanding, one glance around any TV or movie set reveals a veritable revolution in lighting. The role of LEDs is expanding rapidly, from illuminating a single anchor on a modest news set to illuminating a 20-meter cyclorama on the world’s largest soundstage. LEDs are clearly supplanting tungsten, HMI, and fluorescent luminaires in pretty much every application.

Utilizing latest-generation surfaced-mounted LEDs, the Sola 12 is the first LED Fresnel with a high CRI to surpass the 2K tungsten output hurdle. The acrylic lens of the Sola exhibits fewer chromatic aberrations than a glass lens, which is brighter and frankly just as likely to shatter from a physical assault.

Over the last few years, there have been significant advances in LED technology. The Sola 12 is the first LED Fresnel to exceed the 2K tungsten equivalent output. It is flicker-free, fully dimmable, and produces very little heat. With a CRI of 97, it consumes only 5% the power of a comparable-output HMI, which is three times the weight. All of this comes in an economical light that is guaranteed to maintain a constant output for 50,000 hours.

Why not embrace the new light instead of smashing it on the floor?

One reason, of course, is the (still) non-continuous spectral output of LEDs, which is an ongoing cause of concern for some shooters. Yes, we like the brightness and low power draw of today’s LEDs. The latest surface-mounted type is far more efficient, outputting four times more light than the 5mm recessed variety used previously. But, more critically, Litepanel’s development of new (much more expensive) red-emitting phosphors has addressed the significant holes in LED’s output spectrum. 

While the blue spike typical of LEDs is still present in the output of the Sola 12, the phosphors have improved dramatically and now produce a more continuous balanced spectrum. Cheaper LEDs exhibit a strong blue or green spike because the phosphor that produces these colors is less expensive than the phosphors that emit red wavelengths. The effect of this is that cheaply made LED lighting will often be brighter and bluer/greener than higher quality units that produce more saturated red tones.

Pro shooters know that colors not present when lighting a set cannot be effectively restored in post. Thus, the demand for LEDs that exhibit a more continuous spectral output persists among serious shooters.

With respect to beam pattern, the Sola 12 appears as a single source with no hint of multiple shadows. The surface LEDs are arrayed with optimal spacing, close enough to produce the look of a single source but separated enough to maintain acceptable heat levels. Just as it is with a camera’s sensor, heat dissipation is critical to maintaining a reliable and constant color output. The Sola 12 utilizes extensive heat sinks and liquid cooling to maintain a reasonable operating temperature.

Still, many shooters are reluctant to fully embrace LED lighting due to ongoing concerns regarding ruggedness of construction. The Sola, like other professional discharge-type  instruments, features some relatively fragile components (the LED panel, processor, and PC boards) that are constructed in ways more like a laptop computer than traditional lighting. As such, today’s LED lighting requires proper care and handling. The casual toppling of instruments at exhibits and demonstrations is great for show, but not great for the light.

The ruggedness quotient may not be up to the standards of traditional heavy tungsten heads with thick lenses and beefy frames, but the performance and versatility of the Sola series LEDs are simply too great now to be ignored—by even the most recalcitrant among us.