Kino Flo Image 45 Green Hue

[Nick Childress]

I dropped some major cash to add the big name Kino and some flexibility to my first lighting kit (2 USED Image 45/s from different sellers and brand new 488-K32 bulbs). But they have a green tint when white balance is set to Arri Tungsten Fresnels (new bulbs) for mixed lighting. From what I've read, the 4' fixtures should not require any correction to mix with Tungsten, but the difference on skin tones is obvious.

 

I called Kino and they said to burn the bulbs for 50 hours (despite that is actually done to get past a magenta tint). I did anyways. No change. No more responses from Kino. Here's what I've found out through more testing:

 

-On HO, the bulbs appear fine at first. After ~10 minutes, they get the green.

-On STD, no green spike (but I lose half a stop and the bulbs are supposed to be burned on the HO setting per STD is for normal, household bulbs)

-With a -1/8 green gel, it improves, but leaves a little magenta tint and skin still doesn't look right. NO color meter to nail it down. Besides this, no other gels, cinefoil or other heat capturing was done on any tests. All tests done in mid-70's Fahrenheit studio

-When I use the 2005 Kino bulbs that came with one of the units, they are very pink to the eye, but on skin, they match much better in HO mode with no green tint

-The old 2005 bulbs are F40/T12/K32 but the new bulbs are F75/T12/K32. They don't make an F40 4' anymore. What is the F number?

-Fixture panel says they have "Rating: F40". What does that mean? Is it an older ballast than won't work with the current bulbs and I'm just out of luck?

 

My best guesses:

 

-Ballasts are just too old. Do they overheat and turn green with age?

-The Rating of F40 means the ballasts weren't designed to work with the F75 bulbs

-Bulbs are a bad batch. Has anyone run into this?

-Even 4' Kino's need gelling to match despite all the claims, hype, reputation

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Nick

[John Sprung]

I think the F number is nominal Watts. If you can't get the bulbs, that's probably why they sold the fixtures.

 

 

 

 

-- J.S.

[Michael E Brown]

The lamps are the same. Wattage on a floro is actually determined by the ballast, and the Kino ballast overdrives the lamps to achieve 75w. So a normal F40 household lamp in a Kino 4' fixture on HO is being driven to 75w. The first Kino lamps were labeled F40 as their simple brotherin. Kino decided to relabel them F75 to designate that they are running at 75w. Same tube, same formula, different marker. So - this should have nothing to do with your problem. I have both types in rental stock and they get mixed around with no issues.

 

The ballast should not be causing this problem, but anything is possible. Most of the time it just doesn't work if the ballast is hooey.

 

KF32s usually read around 3400K and very little green on my Color Meter IV. Are you seeing the green tint in person or on the video?

[Nick Childress]

Thanks for the clarification on the F40/F75. I'm seeing the green tint on Sony Alpha stills (awaiting the arrival of video unit). I've tried 3 different methods for white balance:

 

1. White balancing to Tungsten. Tungsten looks great. Kino's look green.

 

2. Using the dial-in white balance set between 3200-3800K. Tungsten looks great, Kino's look green.

 

3. White balancing to Kino's. Kino's look good. Tungsten looks bad (trying to remember exactly what, but I'm guessing it was too magenta).

 

Basically, all the testing I've done shows problems in the Green/Magenta axis, not Kelvin.

 

FYI... In the above, I'm referring to whatever the light hits, not the lights themselves. It's most noticeable in skin tones or A/B'ing stills. If it will help, I can take some more stills to desired methodology and upload.