Skip to main content

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.

Original Post

Replies sorted oldest to newest

Hi, welcome to the forums. My guess is the fixtures you have have a low quality LED driver with low refresh rates, so you need something that has a higher refresh rate. I would have you look at grabbing just one of these to test with: https://www.eliminatorlighting.com/mini-par-rgbw-led 
They are pretty affordable at 29 bucks MAP price each. they have a really nice white and they do color mix with RGB, you'll get more of a tighter wash coverage instead of a flat field "spot like" coverage with these, but they are a good  price to test with. 
Also we have not heard of anyone telling us these Mini pars flicker on videos. 
Here are a few example of them on the Eliminator booth at various tradeshows (Eliminator is a sister brand  to ADJ for the low-to mid level budget, but STILL  quality)
https://youtu.be/NkFjDbF-PZk 
There is actually one running inside of a white scrim table throughout this whole video.... but the rest are in the center of the triangle truss in that video.

https://youtu.be/cfJiq4NWYLI 
This video they are on the truss going vertically up and down on the back, you'll see them as you can see the individual red green and blue leds and the white. But they color mix in the air just fine.  

Does this help, do you need me to point you to a dealer for you to purchase them? We don't sell on Ebay.  

Yes, that does help a lot That price point is fine, although they say they are $39.00 each, not $29.00 when I open the link. That's still a good price however. Do I understand they the individual LEDs are not tri-color, you just have several Red, Green, Blue, and White LEDs in the same case? How far away does the light need to be from it's subject in order to get an even color mix? I assume the closer you get the more you would see individual colors brighter in some areas. Also, I always thought that to get white, you just turn up R,G, and B at the same time to the same intensity. That's how the ones I use now work. No matter, as long as they produce enough lumens to be 15 or 20 feet away, they will be fine.

As seen in my video, I do need there not to be much bleed over from one skeleton to the next. If I want to light just one, I need to be able to do that so that it's noticeable that only that one is being singled out, so I do need more of a spotlight than a floodlight.

I will probably purchase one soon to check it out regardless.

The light that you saw flickering in the first video is a tighter focused spot with a sharp circle, which is the exact effect I want for the extra head that gets lifted up. I use 2, one shining in from each side. Those were the first link for a light that I posted. I was only using white for that spot in this video, but it would need to be able to do colors as well. Do you have anything like that light? Until one that I have breaks down, those are the only two lights I currently have that I have flicker trouble with. Your link gives me a decent replacement for when one of the other lights die, but I still also need to replace those highly focused pin spotlights, similar to something that would be aimed at a mirrorball, maybe a little bigger area. The ones I have throw a fairly small circle even at 20 feet, which is what I want for that spotlight.

Thanks again!

Hi, look at the pinspots that ADJ offers, but they will go up in price, but for the ADJ stuff you'll not see any pricing on there, just ADJ points, and for the points, subtract one point and that gives you the advertised price, but you'll pay less if you purchase through a dealer. 
Look at these options: 
https://www.adj.com/products/static-wash/pinspots/ 

The Pinpoint GOs are good, but battery powered, also the Saber spots are good options as well and come with a variety of lens options too...

Thank you so much for all the info. It's a little more than I wanted to spend since I already have a working system (to the naked eye) that looks really good using $15 to $25 fixtures, but I think it's worth it not to have the distracting issues in the videos. It was surprisingly difficult to find anyone who knew what lights to look for and the people who sell most of the lower priced fixtures have no idea what I was talking about and apparently could not be bothered to test their own products to see.

 

I appreciate your insight and knowledge, and as soon as I'm sure that I will still be getting paychecks, I will be purchasing some of the items you presented here.

 

I like the eliminator series, and I'm trying to decide between the Saber Spot RGBW and the Pinspot LED Quad DMX, both from ADJ. I already know the quality of ADJ products since I was a mobile DJ for 25 years and used many products from ADJ, but I got out of that business in 2005, so I never really got into the LED lighting or DMX during that time.

Add Reply

Post
×
×
×
×
Link copied to your clipboard.
×