7 ms·

Very true, color rendering, or god forbid flicker, are the main culprits to me. Over the last few years a ton of players have entered the film lighting space,

by korm 4y ago

Very true, color rendering, or god forbid flicker, are the main culprits to me. Over the last few years a ton of players have entered the film lighting space, with many offerings exceeding Arri's color rendering for far cheaper. Yuji LEDs or iFootage for example make some of the most accurate lights at 98+ cri. The film industry will still go for Arris for other reasons, but at home we have lots of options nowadays. Amazon listings will always claim ridiculous cri numbers, try to find a 3rd party measurement. https://indiecinemaacademy.com/complete-led-color-database-cri-tlci-cqs-tm30-15 https://indiecinemaacademy.com/complete-led-color-database-c.... https://youtu.be/qCyKdIgRVTk https://youtu.be/qCyKdIgRVTk

xxs 4y ago
>or god forbid flicker That's just terrible drivers - likely an unisolated AC with a single coil. Flicker is trivial to defeat sacrificing the power factor (just add filtering caps). Overall there is nothing hard about using constant driven high-freq (over 30KHz, so no sound interference, either) LEDs. Side note: in the days of home video calls, you can tell how many have terrible lights as the flicker is visible on the even camera.
- dx034 4y ago
  The problem just is that it's really hard to find good LEDs. Maybe they're all being sold to industrial consumers, but it's been a pain to find good LEDs if you're looking for anything more "exotic". E.g. dimmable LEDs work and are available, but there is so much cheap trash out there while good brands are often sold out. And for many sockets, there's maybe one manufacturer offering it, if at all. I've had instances where only cheap vendors offered LEDs for a certain socket.
  - xxs 4y ago
    Hmm, It'd appear you wish to retrofit LEDs in existing fixtures. That's the rub - they are not designed to work well - there is so much space for a LED driver + LEDs + cooling + looking nice. Most LEDs are overdriven to show higher lumen numbers (and watts) on the tin, which means a short life. Dimmable LEDs with a standard triac based dimmer for incandescent bulbs is a bad idea overall. The decent LED fixtures are designed to be a single unit, e.g. near ceiling light, dimmable w/ remote/blue tooth. Unfortunately, not possible to replace parts of them, and if they are poorly built - also overdriven. OTOH, they are trivial to repair with some electronics background - often times, the driver is replaceable entirely. LEDs need to stay cool (below 60C) to have prolonged life - say 40K hours to stay at 80% brightness. That means large heatsinks, enough space to dissipate the heat.
    - dx034 4y ago
      I've already replaced dimmers to work with LEDs. But changing all fixtures would be way too expensive, it'd then be cheaper to just stick with Halogen. And I don't need any "smart" features, an LED that can be dimmed via an external dimmer would be enough. But they're harder to find than all these "smart" devices that might stop working after a few years and can send data to who-knows-who.
      - LargoLasskhyfv 4y ago
        Check these out: [1] https://www.osram.com/ecat/Professional%20LED%20lamps%20with%20filament-style%20LED%20technology-LED%20lamps-Lamps-Digital%20Systems/com/en/GPS01_3122242/ https://www.osram.com/ecat/Professional%20LED%20lamps%20with...
      - xxs 4y ago
        >I've already replaced dimmers to work with LEDs. While not impossible - the LED driver is a switch mode power supply, most of them would be universal one taking 90V-260V with rather variable frequency. What dimmers do - they chop the sine wave, normally that would not affect too much the driver (aside made them hot or require more bulk capacitance, which they lack) - so they have to know that the sine wave was chopped and react by reducing the duty cycle, reducing the brightness of the LEDs. That complicates the driver, however if you don't keep the LEDs at full brightness and they are not hot on touch - they should last. The other option would be communicating through the zero cross of the sine wave, but I doubt very much it's the case. The external dimmer is not a smart feature but more like necessity, unfortunately.
    - Am4TIfIsER0ppos 4y ago
      God, LEDs must be the worst scam foisted upon us by governments. Flicker, lies about the lifespan, and now you say I must replace the entire lamp when it fails rather than just the bulb.
      - dx034 4y ago
        I don't think there's any malice. They're far superior when it comes to energy consumption. And they generally work well. They're just part of a general trend that it's hard to find high-quality products anymore. Unless you have industry expertise, it's extremely hard to determine which appliances are usable. Traditional DYI stores sometimes provide that expertise, buying online it's nearly impossible to search for quality.
  - jonnycomputer 4y ago
    I just want LEDs that don't noticeably flicker (i'm talking 3Hz here) after a year of operation.
    - xxs 4y ago
      My bet: terrible capacitors and the driver ran hot (which caused the laps to leak out). Bad driver. Honestly I have no clue why LED light are so poorly built nowadays. There is absolutely no technical reason for it.

by korm 4y ago

xxs 4y ago

>or god forbid flicker That's just terrible drivers - likely an unisolated AC with a single coil. Flicker is trivial to defeat sacrificing the power factor (just add filtering caps). Overall there is nothing hard about using constant driven high-freq (over 30KHz, so no sound interference, either) LEDs. Side note: in the days of home video calls, you can tell how many have terrible lights as the flicker is visible on the even camera.

dx034 4y ago
The problem just is that it's really hard to find good LEDs. Maybe they're all being sold to industrial consumers, but it's been a pain to find good LEDs if you're looking for anything more "exotic". E.g. dimmable LEDs work and are available, but there is so much cheap trash out there while good brands are often sold out. And for many sockets, there's maybe one manufacturer offering it, if at all. I've had instances where only cheap vendors offered LEDs for a certain socket.
- xxs 4y ago
  Hmm, It'd appear you wish to retrofit LEDs in existing fixtures. That's the rub - they are not designed to work well - there is so much space for a LED driver + LEDs + cooling + looking nice. Most LEDs are overdriven to show higher lumen numbers (and watts) on the tin, which means a short life. Dimmable LEDs with a standard triac based dimmer for incandescent bulbs is a bad idea overall. The decent LED fixtures are designed to be a single unit, e.g. near ceiling light, dimmable w/ remote/blue tooth. Unfortunately, not possible to replace parts of them, and if they are poorly built - also overdriven. OTOH, they are trivial to repair with some electronics background - often times, the driver is replaceable entirely. LEDs need to stay cool (below 60C) to have prolonged life - say 40K hours to stay at 80% brightness. That means large heatsinks, enough space to dissipate the heat.
  - dx034 4y ago
    I've already replaced dimmers to work with LEDs. But changing all fixtures would be way too expensive, it'd then be cheaper to just stick with Halogen. And I don't need any "smart" features, an LED that can be dimmed via an external dimmer would be enough. But they're harder to find than all these "smart" devices that might stop working after a few years and can send data to who-knows-who.
    - LargoLasskhyfv 4y ago
      Check these out: [1] https://www.osram.com/ecat/Professional%20LED%20lamps%20with%20filament-style%20LED%20technology-LED%20lamps-Lamps-Digital%20Systems/com/en/GPS01_3122242/ https://www.osram.com/ecat/Professional%20LED%20lamps%20with...
    - xxs 4y ago
      >I've already replaced dimmers to work with LEDs. While not impossible - the LED driver is a switch mode power supply, most of them would be universal one taking 90V-260V with rather variable frequency. What dimmers do - they chop the sine wave, normally that would not affect too much the driver (aside made them hot or require more bulk capacitance, which they lack) - so they have to know that the sine wave was chopped and react by reducing the duty cycle, reducing the brightness of the LEDs. That complicates the driver, however if you don't keep the LEDs at full brightness and they are not hot on touch - they should last. The other option would be communicating through the zero cross of the sine wave, but I doubt very much it's the case. The external dimmer is not a smart feature but more like necessity, unfortunately.
  - Am4TIfIsER0ppos 4y ago
    God, LEDs must be the worst scam foisted upon us by governments. Flicker, lies about the lifespan, and now you say I must replace the entire lamp when it fails rather than just the bulb.
    - dx034 4y ago
      I don't think there's any malice. They're far superior when it comes to energy consumption. And they generally work well. They're just part of a general trend that it's hard to find high-quality products anymore. Unless you have industry expertise, it's extremely hard to determine which appliances are usable. Traditional DYI stores sometimes provide that expertise, buying online it's nearly impossible to search for quality.
- jonnycomputer 4y ago
  I just want LEDs that don't noticeably flicker (i'm talking 3Hz here) after a year of operation.
  - xxs 4y ago
    My bet: terrible capacitors and the driver ran hot (which caused the laps to leak out). Bad driver. Honestly I have no clue why LED light are so poorly built nowadays. There is absolutely no technical reason for it.