With the aid of a butterfly net and chimera soft box, the talk did more to extol the virtues of soft lighting in confined spaces than live up to its rather laconic billing, ‘Lighting By The Seat Of Your Pants.’ Advocating the use of reflective, rather than direct lighting, Dave Lock explained that the ARRI X Series - the X2 (200W), X5 (575W - the model which was demonstrated), X12 (1200W), 25/40 (2.5K/4K) and X60 (6K) - were the result of the Japanese requirement for a 130° flood, non lens lamp producing a hard shape. He illustrated how much closer this could be operated to the butterfly net to produce the diffused effect, when measured alongside a conventional ARRI 575 HMI Compact, which offers a 55° spread.
"Space is always a problem, and with the X-Lights you can virtually touch the butterfly net and they will produce an incredibly crisp shadow - creating a spread of light over a reduced distance -whereas the 575 HMI would have to be sited far back," he illustrated. The other advantage of the X-Lights he said, were ease of colour change and level control. Aided by the STLD’s Roger Duncan, Dave Lock backed up his presentation showing VHS clips of BBC drama to illustrate effective (and in some instances not so effective) use of location lighting, particularly where the intrusion of natural light had to be compensated for.
Today, ARRI’s X-series is in use in the most diverse areas - in film and television productions, events, in the theatre and in photography.
(Ruth Rossington)
