OT: Blue Bulb Hazard Warning, & Safety Advice Request

AW
Posted By
Allen_Wicks
Apr 7, 2004
Views
339
Replies
15
Status
Closed
This just happened this evening and I wanted to post a warning right away:

Many of the pix that I shoot have some, often unavoidable, component of outdoor light from windows or whatever. To maintain color balance I use 5000 degree color temperature "Blue Bulbs" for much of my lighting.

Tonight a 500 watt bulb violently exploded. It sounded exactly like a .22 pistol round up close, and threw glass a distance of six feet. No big deal because I was shooting product and the light was just lighting background seamless anyway. The bulbs, fixtures, etc. were all being used as designed.

However, my face was frequently within a foot or so of the main lights. And in the past I have often used those lights two feet from [expensive] models’ faces.

This post is intended as a warning to folks who may be as naive as I was. I will be changing my lighting protocol henceforth. How I don’t know yet, but any guidance would be appreciated. Note that covering the lighting fixtures is not an option due to potential overheating.
Related Tags
advice blue request warning

MacBook Pro 16” Mockups 🔥

– in 4 materials (clay versions included)

– 12 scenes

– 48 MacBook Pro 16″ mockups

– 6000 x 4500 px

T
Todie
Apr 7, 2004
Flying blue photoflood broken glass burned holes in a plastic shower curtain I was using as background for a shoot.

For digital you can use Home Depot quartz lights, but try used … slide projector lights first : )

<http://www.ganoksin.com/borisat/nenam/light.htm>
P
Phosphor
Apr 7, 2004
Quick and simple, maybe wrong…but what about constructing a barrier, similar to a "P" (plosive) Pop-Topper Filter <http://www.sweetwater.com/store/category/c394/cp378> as used in recording studios?

Perhaps from a wire frame and mosquito netting…something that is virtually transparent. It would not have to be directly attached to the lighting unit…it could be offset a little way—depending on the fabric used—to avoid melting or burning.

Whatever you might devise will likely mess with color temperature or lumens value a wee bit, so you’d have to adjust your post-production workflow to compensate.

Just some brainstorming offered in the name of the archangels of OSHA.

I can’t help thinking there might be a market for these accessories, because I’ve also seen studio lights spontaneously blow out on more than a few occasions.

Keep that finger grease and ambient dirt cleaned off the glass bulb!!!
T
Todie
Apr 7, 2004
Keep that finger grease and ambient dirt cleaned off the glass bulb!!! Correct! (best–never touch the glass)
AS
Ann_Shelbourne
Apr 7, 2004
If you use barn-doors on your reflectors you can peg a sheet of tissue paper, or a muslin scrim, across their flaps. This serves two purposes: it softens the light and would act as a shield against flying glass.

I actually use studio flash but the pilot lights are tungsten bulbs and this method works with them and does not cause them to overheat.

The other way is to bounce the light backwards into an umbrella (which would also work as an exploding-glass-deflector).
AW
Allen_Wicks
Apr 7, 2004
Umbrellas are a good idea, a quick short term solution since I am already equipped for them, even though they eat power and are totally softening.

The incident was very scary. Either myself or worse still a model could easily have lost an eye in front of that bulb.

Usually I don’t touch these bulbs, using the paper case to hold them while inserting. Yesterday I had some anomalies and did touch the bulb.
J
JasonSmith
Apr 7, 2004
They’re not bulbs – they’re lamps.
AW
Allen_Wicks
Apr 7, 2004
Looks like a bulb, glows like a bulb, fits in a standard 110 volt light bulb socket.

It must be a duck. Let’s invade yet another second rate nation with little military capability; not quite 100% of the world hates us, we need more hatred. No new taxes…

But it explodes like a lamp – now I get it!
J
JasonSmith
Apr 7, 2004
If you can touch it with your fingertips and not have it explode: yeah it’s a bulb.

If you cant touch it without expolsions – it’s a lamp!
WZ
Wade_Zimmerman
Apr 8, 2004
Are you not using a strobe unit?

I use mono lights by Elinchrom although I have the older models they are now both fan cooled and remote controllable. This means you can without touching the lights
turn one off or on change the output of any individual light and program the for a sequence all from the camera and trigger them without a sync cord. Most strobe manufacturers make remote control/programmable units certain digital equipment (cameras and backs can control these units without and attachment.

That is one possibility.

The other possibility is the new fluorescent type lighting such as the Kino or Lowelll makes then as well they come ready to accept Daylight (5000K) full spectrum or (3200K) Tungsten balanced full spectrum lamps as well as if you are working under
existing fluorescent lighting the same fluorescent bulbs as the environment is using for location work simple filtration at the lens. Say the location is a supermarket?

I think you get it.

The pros of this type lighting, diffused lighting very soft and almost non existing shadows.

The cons of this type of light (see the above)

Also it is not the most powerful light so you need a lot to make it work well.

They are big and bulky and start out at the big discount house such as B&H at $1,100 without the lamps.

They last a very long time but do age.

The third is the HMI not likely to burst ever, they use them for motion pictures. They get very close to the subjects such as actors that are worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Never ever heard of them bursting. They are also gas discharge are daylight balanced excellent color a 1250 watt HMI is the equivalent to a 3750 watt tungsten bulb. An Arri cost about $2,800 not including the bulb, that cost $600. Does not last for ever. Heavy and you need a flicker free model and it is a two piece deal the head and the ballast.

Those are the choices the HMIs are extremely versatile.

The Monolights cost from $650.00 to $1,600.00 per unit depending on the watt seconds and brand.

Elinchroms are the brand that many fashion photographers prefer especially the monolights for location work.
LP
Louise_Parrish
Apr 8, 2004
Allen

Hope you have insurance covering this sort of thing.

Louise Parrish
AW
Allen_Wicks
Apr 8, 2004
Wade-

Thanks for your suggestions, I will do some homework. Yes I do use strobes but have grown to prefer 5000K hot lights for many things. Shooting digitally and with hotlights can be very fast as well as extremely versatile. I often shoot in retail environments that are not conducive to lengthy photo shoots, and budgets normally don’t allow for time consuming shoots anyway.

Currently I use a mix of strobes with individual trial-and-error setups. My intent has been to switch to using strobes 100%, set up around Nikon’s wireless i-TTL using multiple Nikon SB-800 strobes. Unfortunately the final component of my planned system (D2x camera) is not out yet and the D2h does not quite suit my needs, so I have been making do. My D100 does access many of the capabilities of the Nikon SB-800 strobe system, so perhaps now is the time to put it together.

———————————–
Louise-

The clients (deep pockets) are well insured and I use their locations. My insurance is lame, but my pockets are shallow…
WZ
Wade_Zimmerman
Apr 9, 2004
You might find some of the remote controlled monolights to be even more suitable and far more powerful a few of them you can control the duration of the the flash as well.

A couple of 500 watt second elinchroms weight about 8lbs togehter!

Balcar makes some that are international that is they seek out the voltge no adapters are necessary.
AW
Allen_Wicks
Apr 9, 2004
At reasonable cost only Nikon fully controls all strobes wirelessly and i-TTL. Not just preplanned fractional flash duration control, but actual precise wireless duration control by the camera to all strobes. And each strobe can be individually adjusted in stop fractions as well. And the camera reads the subject based on focus point; quite cool.

The power may be an issue, however, when soft boxes get involved.
AS
Ann_Shelbourne
Apr 9, 2004
I agree with Wade. I have been using Monolites for years.

Their huge advantage is that they do not need to be physically connected to each other (or even to the camera if you have an IR transmitter) which makes them ideal for use on location.

There is quite a wide range of reflectors, barndoors, snoots etc. available for them, as well as various umbrellas.
They don’t weigh that much, pack compactly into their cases and pack a wallop of lighting power.
WZ
Wade_Zimmerman
Apr 9, 2004
I believe that elinchrom has a 1200 ws unit and balcar has a 1500 ws unit.

A Pocket Wizard can turn any unit on or off and these new models you can control in any configuration you want and you can set it as a sequence that is a programmed series of flash for instance flash one two 500ws units pop at half power, flash two
one 500 ws at full power and two 1000 ws Units at 3/4 power. This can be done a a manual or automatic sequence. For instance you have a figure moving through a space you now have a faint figure in one location and a darker transparent figure in the second location.

For location work I could never understand anyone bringing power packs.

And you can always get battery operated units for a location that has no power supply.

In the long run monolights are the most cost efficient lighting source. The only thing that hurts is that they are a little more delicate than power packs and tend to be a bit on the stealth side so you have to remember that you have them set up or crash-o-rama.

MacBook Pro 16” Mockups 🔥

– in 4 materials (clay versions included)

– 12 scenes

– 48 MacBook Pro 16″ mockups

– 6000 x 4500 px

Related Discussion Topics

Nice and short text about related topics in discussion sections