tech: battle of the bulbs shootout
April 15, 2008 – 5:00 amTo date I’ve been using standard 75 watt household bulbs in the clamp lights used in the DIY lighting videos. But there are tons of bulb choices out there (tungsten, halogen, fluorescent), and I’ve been getting questions about how they compare. Well, that’s something that’s hard to describe and, after all, we’re visual people. So let’s fire ‘em up and take a look. The contenders:
GE Soft White, 100 watt, (the standard household bulb), tungsten, $0.80
GE Reveal, 100 watt, (clear glass, light blue in color), tungsten but called “full spectrum”, $1.75
n:vision daylight spiral, 27 watt = 100 watt equivalent, (the only daylight balanced bulb in test), fluorescent, $6.97
Philips Indoor / Outdoor Spot, 90 watt, (large and heavy) halogen, $5.97
Nikon SB28 flash unit (as a nod to Strobist), used as a control for color balance. If you want to mix flash and constant light sources this will provide a good comparison.
The Goals? To record and compare the visible light patterns, color balance and intensity of each light to one another. Here are the comparison photos…pretty darn eye-opening, I think. Below the chart are technical details of the setup and some thoughts.
| FLASH WHITE BALANCE | TUNGSTEN WHITE BALANCE |
| Nikon SB28, set at 28mm, 1/125 @ f8, flash on Auto | |
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| n:vision spiral daylight fluorescent, 1 sec @ f7.1, (-1/3 stop from baseline) | |
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| reveal 100, 1 sec @ f11, (+1 stop from baseline but center spot is +3 stops) | |
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| Philips Spot Halogen, 1 sec @ f22, (+3 stops from baseline) | |
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| GE Soft White, 1 sec @ f8, (0 stops, this bulb is baseline) | |
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The test setup:
Clamp light: 7.5″ in diameter placed 4 feet from light gray wall. Light rated up to 150 watts (important if you’re going to use larger bulbs). While all are relatively inexpensive ($4 and up), there are a variety of clamp lights
Camera: Canon 20D set to small JPG, exposed with both Flash and Tungsten White Balance, Adobe 1998 color space, shutter speed of 1 second, camera placed 10 feet from wall (6 feet behind clamp light).
Lens: Canon 28-105 f3.5-4.5 set at 28mm.
The test was set up so it can be easily repeated and more bulbs can be added to the database if needed. I gotta tell ya, I learned a lot.
My quick thoughts:
GE Soft White 100: similar in coverage to the SB28 at 28mm. If you’re using strictly tungsten light, why not start here? Cheap and easy.
GE reveal 100: I don’t get it. The light blue color does nothing visible and clear glass makes for way funky light patterns from the tungsten filament. The tiny center spot is WAY hot. I guess it could be used as a really tiny spot light, expose for the bright center beam and let the rest fall off.
nvision daylight spira fluorescent: Nice. Very soft pattern (if that’s what you’re after) and it only loses -1/3 stop to the Soft White. Plus it’s balanced close to the strobe. This might be the smartest bet if you’re building a system around this type of setup.
Philips Spot Halogen: Nice spot, right on the tungsten light balance. It is a heavy bulb, though, so you’ll want to make sure the screws are tight on the clamp light.
Nikon SB28: Hey, it can be fun to mix strobe and tungsten, purposely making things blue or orange. Above is the visible evidence of how blue or orange you can expect things to turn.
If you go to Home Depot you’ll see there are a bazillion bulbs available. You’ll find spirals inside spots and ‘reveals’ with frosted glass. Keeping in mind the four tested bulbs and their inherent characteristics should give a good start to determining what other bulbs might do. If you feel like doing online research then you can check with the authority: the GE lighting products page or download their massive (7.2 MB) complete pdf lighting product catalog.
Looking for more information on color spectrum? NormMonkey has the complete lowdown on differences between incandescent and compact flourescent over at Gnurple dot Net.
Your observations on the above results?
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8 Responses to “tech: battle of the bulbs shootout”
I guess at the end it depends on where you are planning to shoot. If powerplugs are availble, these normal bulbs would seem to give you whole lot of light/dollar. In addition to all the other stuff, its much easier to study the setting before hand with standard bulbs and take pictures with flash and then try to study from LCD whether or not it looked how you want it to look.
On the other hand, if you have to go into location were you can’t be certain whether or not power plugs are available, then its hard to beat SB-28, especially since you can also put it on camera.
What comes to bulb vs. bulb, I guess it depends on what you are looking for at the time. Its like you can use flash without any diffusers, with softbox or with snoot. I guess Philips Spot Halogen might provide nice snoot sort of effect, while nvision’s spiral would be most convenient for everyday use.
By Juha Ylitalo on Apr 15, 2008
Really interesting post, as always. Thanks! After using the Nvision bulbs all over my house, I’m a little surprised at how good they look in the clamp light. That’s a lot of nice light with very little discernible fall off…maybe a bulb to consider for a hair light or similar application.
By Rich on Apr 15, 2008
One thing to note about fluorescent bulbs: they don’t create the full spectrum of light, the same way that a white-hot filament (or the sun) does.
It might be interesting to re-do this test with a colour chart as the subject. Or, just compare shots on a colour chart between the spiral light and a filament-based bulb. Even after adjusting for white-balance and exposure there might be some difference (I suppose the bulb would perform better than the spiral).
By NormMonkey on Apr 15, 2008
I use the Reveal bulbs in all my lamps at home. They provide a much more natural color temperature than soft white, which looks yellow on the walls. They’re not daylight balanced, which looks too blue/green at night in a house. In other words, they’re for lighting your house, not your pictures
By jlbec on Apr 16, 2008
Hello bro, how’s going. I have been watching your videos on youtube. They’re great and very explicative
Thanks for sharing these tutorials about setting up all the stuff, mainly, because the people who live in the third world and don’t have enough money and resources to build up an studio set, like me ^^
With “resources” I mean: In Argentina is almost impossible to find all the stuff, even If I have the money to buy something, the shops have not stock, so, lamps and simple things like you have in your set is affordable and available here
Well… I have some questions.
The firest one is: how much shu8tter speed at ISO 100 are you able to shot with the 27 Watts NVision Lamps… Seems 1 sec, as I see in your tests… I would like to shot between 1/60 and 1/200. How much watts do you suggest to handle this kind of shutter speed? I’m going to buy some lamps, and the clamp lamp, if I find it in some shop. Take into account I’m going to buy the piece of nylon fabric, I have read is much better than other diffuser solution. There’re no other things in my country than textil things for this kind of photography set.
I already have a flash Sigma with N50 number which can be defussed with the fabric material. I’m also thinking that I can mix the flash with some daylight lamp for fill light, but I don’t know how much watts I should buy. I’m pretty new about illuminating things, I always used available light and a little 500 watts tungsten lamp.
I find quite cool illuminating with flash, but, they’re expensive to me. I should buy 2 flashes, I guess: Main Light, fill light and one for the background. The flash built in camera already is in use to trigger the flash I have, and it illuminates a bit the front side of the objects.
Should I buy 2 flashes or lamps? Can I mix daylight with flash without generating oddities in the color temperature? How much ºK should have the daylight lamps?
Well… That’s all… I should work now
Thank you very much for your tips, I will track them
By Øuantum³ on Apr 25, 2008
Nice try, but the light bulb comparison is rather pointless from my point of view. The only thing it really compares is the “coverage” and which WB preset works best with each bulb.
These facts are kinda needless, as coverage depends on the power of each bulb and maybe on the used reflector, the proper white balance can be adjusted with most cameras. Unfortunately, more interesting questions remain unanswered, such as the spectra of the light (will all colors be reproduced properly?) and the tendency of the light sources to flicker in the frequency of the supplied electricity. And last but not least the stability of the color temperature over the life time of each bulb.
By Rod on May 1, 2008
Rod, those are all great questions. I’ve just posted a followup to the site (and have included a link to it on this post) that addresses the color spectrum differences of compact fluorescent vs. incandescent. It is a very informative article written by contributor NormMonkey and I hope you find it helpful.
As for your other questions, the answers admittedly exceed my knowledge (without lengthy research) and your inquiries dive deeper than I had intended to go. The study of light (the very basis of photography) is a complex study and, in the context of using these bulbs in a budget lighting setup, I hadn’t considered your questions.
My intention was to show the pattern of light from each bulb (in the same reflector), the relative apertures at the chosen shutter speed and the visual color differences on a neutral background. I can see how my intentions failed to answer your questions.
Many of my posts are intended to help readers begin a journey and I’m sorry this one failed to deliver you to a final destination. It has provoked thought for many, I’m sure, and that’s the key to learning. Please let me know if you have any additional knowledge on the subject to share with readers, I’d be happy link to it.
By Jim Talkington on May 2, 2008