First, I will have to explain what the application is. It's easier to show you. I have a band of lifesized animatronic skeletons that travel around to locations at Halloween time. see here:
I record these live performances as well as others , but I'm having trouble with the DMX lighting. At 10 or 13 seconds in, you'll see one of the skeletons pick up a skull and when the spotlights go on you can see the strobing or flicker as the spotlight comes on for that skull. This is a small production. I don't want to buy Thousands of dollars of top end theater lighting that would be overkill for this. The white light that you see id from a spotlight I bought on ebay that looks like this one. I use two of them. All the other lights don't seem to have that flicker. I bought those years ago. Since them, I have tried to buy more, but all the new ones I buy have the same flicker issue you see at 10 seconds in the video. I can no longer find any like the ones I already have. None of this is visible to the eye, just on camera. The colored lights I am using like these. Again the ones I'm using in this video appear to be the exact same lights as in my link, but these older ones do not flicker on video, however the new ones do. I shot a quick video of a different skull using the exact light from the last link I posted. you can clearly see the flicker here.
The light I am looking at that was used in the video here is indiscernible from the lights I used in the first video for all the colors on the individual skeletons except for the effect they have on video
So my question is, are there any lights I can buy now that are in the same or similar league and price range as the ones I am already using but without the flicker problem? If so, how can you know ahead of time if they will have that problem? I can't justify hundreds of dollars per light for something that only causes a problem on video but that no one can detect at a live show. Does ADJ sell any lights that might fit these requirements? Has anyone else had this issue and managed to solve it? I use a SONY XDCam model#PXW-X70.
Is there anything I can do with the settings on that camera to eliminate the flicker? I have not found any way to adjust the frame rate manually. Only the shutter speed.
This problem has been haunting me for a while. I appreciate all input and hope that maybe ADJ would have lights I can purchase that will not have this problem. I can't afford to buy every light I see just to bring it home and see if it's OK on video.
Thank you.