American Cinematographer - October 2007 - (Page 92)

New Products & Services Bron-Kobold’s DW200 HMI by Jay Holben When I’m working in a situation where an HMI is required, I will usually look for 1,200 watts or more to augment or overpower natural daylight. I’ve worked with some great small fixtures, but when I tried the Bron-Kobold DW200, I was very surprised by not only its versatility, but also its punch. When I first opened the airline case (an optional accessory), I was taken aback by the number of pieces comprising this small fixture. There’s the main head, which is a compact 4"x4"x7"; the Par reflector attachment; the “open face” reflector attachment; a “bare bulb” attachment for use with a softbox; a set of two lenses for the open-face mode; and four Par lenses. In addition, there are the ballast and battery connection, although the battery connection has an old-school two-prong screw connector that I haven’t seen on battery blocks in quite awhile. The paperwork notes that this battery ballast requires 26-34 volts, so I imagine there is a specific Bron battery that I didn’t have the chance to test. There is also an available Fresnel lens that I didn’t have the opportunity to test. The separate reflector attachments affix easily with a small twist and lock securely in place. However, I was never happy doing this with even a slightly warm fixture, as doing so 92 October 2007 exposes the bare HMI globe (and scrapes against the envelope). I’ve had two HMI bulbs (one an 18K) explode and am therefore hesitant to risk any exposure to even a slightly warm, bare HMI globe. I wouldn’t want to switch out reflectors on this fixture unless it was stone cold, but others might not feel that way. The only attachment that gave me some trouble was the “bare bulb” softbox adapter, when the softbox was already attached. As it has a rotation of its own (to easily orient a softbox vertically or horizontally), it was a little tricky to line up the five points of contact and get it to twist-lock in place. Connecting this adapter to the fixture without the softbox attached was a lot easier. The head itself has a spot and flood feature, which alters the position of the globe within the center of the reflector attachments. It has a very smooth range and adjusts easily, but I wish there were some kind of calibration so I could tell at a glance how far toward flood or spot the fixture is positioned. The accessories, lenses and scrims are 5", which is somewhat frustrating because they can’t be replaced with standard Mole or Arri (51⁄8", 130mm) diffusion. Instead, they’ll have to be ordered from Bron. The Par reflector attachment has a parabolic-shaped polished smooth reflector in an enclosed housing with safety glass. The “open face” attachment also has an enclosed housing with safety glass and a parabolic-shaped reflector, but it is pebbled for an overall softer light output. The quality of light from this open-face unit is pleasing enough that I would actually consider using it clean, directly on talent. Although there are specific lenses designed for use with each of the reflector attachments, they are all the same size and can be used interchangeably. The frost lens, intended for use with the open-face attachment, works well with the Par attachment, as do any of the Par lenses with the open face. In fact, I couldn’t decide which I liked better: the wide lens on the Par attachment or the open-face attachment. Both gave a very pleasing light. The medium lens didn’t work well with the open-face attachment, and I wasn’t too pleased with the light quality from the medium lens with the Par attachment, either. There was a lot of variation in the light output with the medium lens, as well as color fringing. This was not true of any other Par Par reflector attachment (readings in footcandles) No lens Spot lens Med lens Wide Spot* Spot / Flood Spot / Flood Spot / Flood 4' 20,000 / 6200 / 1900 6600 / 1400 1200 / 670 6' 8200 / 3100 / 720 2300 / 670 590 / 270 8' 5000 / 1800 / 410 1300 / 360 340 / 170 10' 3300 / 1100 / 240 830 / 260 210 / 100 12' 2200 / 720 / 170 590 / 170 150 / 78 14' 1500 / 590 / 130 410 / 120 100 / 55 16' 1200 / 410 / 97 310 / 97 78 / 42 18' 950 / 340 / 73 260 / 78 64 / 34 20' 770 / 270 / 64 190 / 55 52 / 28 Stipple Spot / Flood 550 / 310 240 / 150 140 / 84 84 / 52 59 / 37 45 / 28 34 / 21 28 / 16 23 / 14 *As mentioned, with the Par attachment in full flood with no lens there is a dark center spot. Because of this, and because of an inability to read a consistent hot center, I elected to omit the Flood dataset.

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American Cinematographer - October 2007

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