Livingston Photography wrote:
With your style of work, hot lights are just fine.

that's interesting, can you elaborate...almost all of my work was done with natural light, strobes or flashes...in fact I only have one hot light shot in there.  No insult taken by any means, I'm just wondering what you saw?

Vera van Munster wrote:
I like hot lights better.They're really hot to be shot under but it shows my makeup beautifully.

Well now with new halogen style bulbs they can be cool to the touch...you should check those out sometime...

damon wrote:
I have a love hate relationship with them.  Obviously they are cheap and do the job.  But it's not so good, especially if I starts sweating and being to stink.  Models don't like that

I could understand the sweat factor, I'm a sweat monster regardless...thankfully not a stinky one. )  But you can get cool to the touch halogen's now that are almost a pure white and are fairly affordable.  Ever try em?

Mark Heaps wrote:

I could understand the sweat factor, I'm a sweat monster regardless...thankfully not a stinky one. )  But you can get cool to the touch halogen's now that are almost a pure white and are fairly affordable.  Ever try em?

I have home depot lights.  do they have those type of bulbs?  Because if so, I'd probably try it.  But, I'm more of a natural light shooter. 

And beginning to use small strobes.

Mark Heaps wrote:

that's interesting, can you elaborate...almost all of my work was done with natural light, strobes or flashes...in fact I only have one hot light shot in there.  No insult taken by any means, I'm just wondering what you saw?

It looks like most of the work is done under continuous light. I get the feeling you "see" better that way and would achieve your style more easily vs. using strobe.

Nello Ryan wrote:
But yeah, in terms of "pleasantness"  strobes are much easier on a model than hot lights.

Not in Wisconsin during the winter. Hotlights rule then.

I know a model who would blink every time a flash was going to go off. I hope see got over that, but I know she missed her opp. with Ford because in her 2 polaroid shots they took-her eyes were closed.

Take the challenge, shoot the same picture with a flash and without, 100% of the time the flash is sharper.

I agree with you here.

Trevor Miles wrote:
Noone's ever said to me "my eyes hurt, let's stop" while I was shooting with strobe, however, I've seen plenty of pictures where models are squinting because of hot lights, in my experience hot lights can also melt makeup, and even the new bulbs dont actually stay cool. These of course being the more ergonomic reasons, Strobe's use less power, Give More Exposure Control, And have the ability to freeze action or accent it when mixed with a continuous light source. I prefer to use the sun, Ugly yellow tungsten lights are not my scene. Besides that they're  sharper. You may say, "THEY'RE NOT SHARPER THEY JUST USE FASTER SHUTTER SPEEDS!?!" Take the challenge, shoot the same picture with a flash and without, 100% of the time the flash is sharper.

nice, I dont' worry about the yellow because you can white balance on the digital to any light we are using...I've had models complain about the strobes constantly flashing and not getting a comfortable model while working.  But with hot lights the pupils stay small and I get big beautiful colorful eyes.  I obviously prefer shooting with natural light also, you can see most of my port is outside...but for some work in the studio I'm starting to love the hotlights more.  Melting make up is an interesting problem though, I'll have to check with some MUA's about this.

thanks.

Livingston Photography wrote:

It looks like most of the work is done under continuous light. I get the feeling you "see" better that way and would achieve your style more easily vs. using strobe.

that's interesting to me...the only shot in my port that is under a hot light/continuous light is the one of hte photographer Mike Naish..the rest are natural light, flash or strobe.  I do definitely see better under hot lights...I like watching the shadows move and compose around that.  That's why I like outdoors most, I can move models and use reflectors to get the forms I want.

Ed Stevenson wrote:
This is like comparing anything.  Each has its advantages and you get to decide what you want to do.  The forums are full of this.

Nikon vs. Canon
Alien Bees vs. Novatron vs. Hensel Vs. etc.
Digital vs. Film
Blonde vs. Brunette vs. Red vs. etc

Oh wait a minute, did I just includes models in a list of hardware.

Oops.

Bald vs Smooth vs Trimmed

Oops. There I go starting something again.

Escorts vs. - ummm I think I'll just end it now. I'm sure you get the point.

for sure, but I wasn't looking for a battle of brands or people's stylings...more like a record of experiences...obviously I can do what I want...look at my port and know that I'm not some GWC.  However I like to learn from other people's experiences and some people have good comments about strobes and some about hotlights...I don't care about brands they mean nothing to me...

Hector Fernandez wrote:
1) The hot factor

a) They are hot and mix make up with sweat.
b) They are hot and mix hair spray or gels or whatever is done in the hair with sweat.
c) They are hot and then the model is uncomfortable when they are moving (fashion)
d) They are hot when shooting male models in bussines suits or coats or rain coats.

2) The power factor

a) A 120 wattseconds open faced strobe at one meter produces de same lumens that a 5000 watts fresnel. (Yeah, I know the beam is bigger in the last one, nicer and with a cooler fall-of but I am talking about lumens)
b) You are forced to shoot around the 1.4-2.8 always (sometimes cool and desirable but not as a forced stuff)
c) Your shutter speed is always slow so you can't freeze your subjects (a sort of tour-de-force in some fashion or editorials styles) if you say "Hey dude but motion pictures and tv crews us hot continous light" I would say yes but the shutter speed of a motion pictures device is always 1/50th
d) In order to light a big area you need very expensive equipment (motion picture style) and only the happy few can afford it plus you need a power plant on the 20k apms to bring juice to that babies (again mucho dinero!) with strobes you can get a portable power pack for 200-500 usd.
e) Modifiers, reflectors and stands for serious equipment is SUPER expensive and heavy and bulky (motion pictures crews hire basically one man by each three light units)
f) Tungsten lights and quartz lights have a 100 hrs. color temp life (more or less) beyond that you have bias in the green-magenta line. Saving bulbs and that kind of stuff are NEVER really at 0° of the kelvin scale in the magenta-green axis and it changes with time so its never the same. (Sure you can white balance on digital but why you are forced to do that always)
g) The regular house-commercial power intake is around the 10kws. If you put more power than 2kws. on a regular house connection the cables could melt due to the heat that is passing throw that particular wire. So they are not safe.
h) Speaking of safe is really common to get burned with that stuff.

3)  The control thing

a) You cannot over-power sun-light with them you are better served with mirrors.
b) All the super-saver bulbs or tubes don't produce real hard light, is something more or less soft but not really soft (as with a light box)
c) Many continous lights are not dimmable (even the cheapest strobes are dimmable) and the ones that are dimmable and work great are really expensive (kinoflo)


4) Economics

a) Besides the pro-motion picture stuff . The stuff dudes like me can afford are cheap shit so they don't even have a semi-professional line of modifiers, reflectors and special attachments.

b) Then spending money on them is money placed in toilet because you can't grow with the system (well, actually there's no system at all)

As my grannie used to say "For the sake of God... stay STROBES" get a good brand, grow your system and be happy knowing that each dime you placed in your equipment is going to be there the next 20 years.

what he said pretty much sums it up. however mixed light is sometimes nice. and stuff like keno's and hmi's can be cool (no pun intended).

Trevor Miles wrote:
Noone's ever said to me "my eyes hurt, let's stop" while I was shooting with strobe, however, I've seen plenty of pictures where models are squinting because of hot lights, in my experience hot lights can also melt makeup, and even the new bulbs dont actually stay cool. These of course being the more ergonomic reasons, Strobe's use less power, Give More Exposure Control, And have the ability to freeze action or accent it when mixed with a continuous light source. I prefer to use the sun, Ugly yellow tungsten lights are not my scene. Besides that they're  sharper. You may say, "THEY'RE NOT SHARPER THEY JUST USE FASTER SHUTTER SPEEDS!?!" Take the challenge, shoot the same picture with a flash and without, 100% of the time the flash is sharper.

yes to every thing he says us flash!

Digital Moonlight wrote:
I tried ever kind of artificial light source I could get my hands on.   For me, strobes definitely are by and far the better solution.

- unless you have A LOT of hotlights you're very limited in terms of aperture and shutter speed.
- getting modifiers for hotlights is a pain, if not a fire hazard.
- more work post production fixing color issues even with custom white balance

I could go on. 

For me the question isn't hot lights vs stobes, it's studio strobes vs speedlites.  I have and use both, I wouldn't want to have to chose between them.

You are SOOOO right!

Mark Heaps wrote:
So I understand the appeal of Strobes but I've found they tend to be a bit more expensive then hotlights and because I shoot exclusively digital setting my white balance to any lighting isn't a problem.  So why shoot with strobes which can hurt the eyes as opposed to shooting with Hot Lights?  Previously I know hot lights were exactly that...HOT...but with new bulbs they stay cool to the touch, and I really don't know any model that minds being warm while they are posing in a studio unless they have a lot of costume on for the shoot.

So what say you all, give me a detremental reason to not buy all hot lights for my studio.  I have remote flashes as I need them, but why not hot lights...

advice is appreciated always.

Strobes don't damage your eyes. The duration of the light is too brief, whereas staring into a 1000 watt light for an extended time at relatively close range can damage your lens and your retina. Also a halogen bulb is HOT no matter what. The surface of a quartz bulb reaches from 970 to 1200 degrees Fahrenheit. Hardly cool to the touch. If you move them while they're cooling they can explode. That's what that wire mesh cover is for. If what you're using is cool to the touch then you must be using 5000K fluorescents. The problem with them is they are not all that bright.

If you were in say New York, in summer Hot lights are too much. Plus in old buildings even 500 watt lights will blow the circuits along with the notorious variable voltage common there

R Nello  wrote:
I love stobes...  and don't forget that they have built in hot lights too.  (i.e. the modeling lights)    Just adjust your white balance and shoot away. 

The expensive brands -like profoto- will have much brighter modeling lights, which will make this kind of approach much easier.

But yeah, in terms of "pleasantness"  strobes are much easier on a model than hot lights.

i looooooooooooove strobes!

they friggin rock!!

so much more you can do in my opinion.......