Video Camera Skills: Lighting: Using Red Heads

A red head kit contains 3 lights (800 watt), 3 stands and selection of gels.

Firstly get a stand and loosen the nut at the bottom by the legs, this will allow you to extend the legs and make it stand upright.

When you open the legs out to support the stand make sure you tighten the nut back up and make sure the legs are set to as far apart as possible, this makes the stand nice a stable.

Stable

Unstable

Once you have the stand in place start extending the pole by loosening the nuts in turn and pulling the sections of the stand and tightening them again.

You can then place the light on top. To do this loosen the nut at the base of the light and pace it onto the top of the stand. You can fix the light to the stand in several different ways. Make sure tighten the nut back up again. Then you can move the light around and open the barn doors.

Turn the light on and start trying to aim it where you want to light, use the yellow focus knob to change the type of beam from flood to spot. Be very careful the light get very hot very fast, it is very easy to burn yourself on the light and barn door. You can also ruin a bulb by moving a light when it is hot, if the element inside the bulb has a vibration when it is hot it will tap the inside of the glass bulb and melt the bulb from the inside out.

Try attaching a gel to the light, you can use diffusion, ND or range of colours. To do this use the small metal clips found on the large barn doors to fix the gel to. Don't worry the gels can take the heat.