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Overhead Lighting for School Bus


Joseph Tese

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We are lighting a schoolbus in a warehouse. The ceilings are high with standard I-Beams..the I-Beams look standard but they are definitely not ultra beefy. We have a single lift to access the ceiling. We also have two condor/cranes provided by the production facility.

We have two s360s and a few other lights.

Ideally I would like to create a rectangular softbox (matching more or less the dimensions of the schoolbus) and suspend the 360s up top. My first thought was to make a truss, about 8’x24’, and rest pipe across it to hold the 360s. Then, drop down with aluminum tubing to hold where we would tie diffusion to it (three 8x8 diff). I was thinking 1/2. Then, we would skirt all the sides from the truss down and even past the diff to make sure the light will mostly only hit the bus. Then, suspend the truss with four chain hoists.

 

Concerns:

-Weight on the I-Beams. 

-Height of the I-Beams

-The amount of rigging involved vs time

 

The other solution I thought was to use the cranes to boom the 360s.. but then I have nothing to skirt the sides on.

Thoughts?

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Why specifically 360s ? Those are going to put a lot of weight and a lot of light in a smaller area on the beams. Lots of small fixtures spread out over the ceiling would give you larger box surface and then allow you to bring the diffusion up higher if headroom is a concern. You could also forego diffusion if you want a more of a light bank style warehouse look vs faking daylight openings in the roof

You could also boom two 8x8 squares of trussing on the condors, one for each panel, if the weight and reach requirements allow it ? I have seen this done quite a lot on outdoor shoots. Could be the fastest to setup as all the assembly would be on the ground and you can move and adjust a lot more easily.

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37 minutes ago, Barnaby Coote said:

Why specifically 360s ? Those are going to put a lot of weight and a lot of light in a smaller area on the beams. Lots of small fixtures spread out over the ceiling would give you larger box surface and then allow you to bring the diffusion up higher if headroom is a concern. You could also forego diffusion if you want a more of a light bank style warehouse look vs faking daylight openings in the roof

You could also boom two 8x8 squares of trussing on the condors, one for each panel, if the weight and reach requirements allow it ? I have seen this done quite a lot on outdoor shoots. Could be the fastest to setup as all the assembly would be on the ground and you can move and adjust a lot more easily.

360s were original thought for rgb control. We have a ladder light of colt LEDs we could string, which I think would work well too if we bypassed rgb effects. But still need a solid truss style rectangle as there needs to be connection points every few feet. Stringing it on the ends will make it dip in the middle.

Putting it on the ceiling would be too high, I believe it is atleast 30’. Id like to increase fall off and less of a general warehouse factory light. In my opinion, lower the better to take advantage of output and make it stylized.

still confirming boom flexibility, but I think one is only 10’. 

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Just thought of this... how do helium balloons work? Do the lights still need hard rigging? Or can lightweight LEDs  actually be lifted inside? perhaps a helium balloon would work, but don’t know much about them or where I could attain one in NC.

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S360s have a lot of output, but they are still comparatively small compared to a 24' softbox. You are likely to have a varying exposure across the diff.

Another issue is that if the soft box is only 8' wide, and it's suspended above the bus, then most of the light is going to be hitting the roof of the bus, and therefore wasted. If I understand your intent properly, you really need the softbox to be above the windows on either side of the bus, which would mean that rig would need to be more like 16' wide, with the lamps hung towards the outer edges rather than the middle. Either that or build two narrower boxes, one for each side of the bus.

Helium balloons are self supporting. The only rigging they need is for the guy lines to stop them floating away. The only ones I've used were a HMI/Tungsten mix, but there are now LED versions available. They are not cheap though; the helium itself is a big expense. Airstar are a major supplier, and they have an office in Atlanta.

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Thanks, Stuart for clarifying. 

Seems like balloons could work but don’t know if I can swing the fast turnaround and expense.

I should mention that for this particular shoot it’s a stripped down bus chassis, so the light should hit the frame fine.. but maybe 12’ would be a better fit to your point.

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Balloon lights are kind of the way to go, and actually might be much cheaper than S360s/rigging gak and especially in time.

As you're inside I believe you can use far less helium than if you were outside-- and perhaps even can use air instead if it's just the inflate the thing and it is tacked, somehow, to the ceiling.

 

Edited by Adrian Sierkowski
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43 minutes ago, Adrian Sierkowski said:

Balloon lights are kind of the way to go, and actually might be much cheaper than S360s/rigging gak and especially in time.

As you're inside I believe you can use far less helium than if you were outside-- and perhaps even can use air instead if it's just the inflate the thing and it is tacked, somehow, to the ceiling.

 

I’m game.. I’ll do my best at researching but I doubt there’s someone close by.

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Wound up safely rigging the truss with 6 motors, and using 4' - Colt LED lights. 96 total, each being 50watts. Very similar to Quasars, if I'm not mistaken they were around prior to them. They accept traditional dimming just like quasars. Pigtailed into the panel with a 50AMP (CS6364) Twistlock. M18s in the back - WB tungsten. If I could do it again, I would move the diff closer to the lights, and pushed to lower the box even more. Can post some better camera stills when able.

 

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