The Good Old LED. It's emergence in Theatre & TV Lighting

I used to do a lot of architectural lighting... many years back, I have lit church halls, churches, offices, wedding halls and cathedrals. My biggest jobs were a Headquarters building and lanscaped grounds in Riyadh KSA and two major wedding halls in Jeddah. Oh yes... there was also the private holiday island for one of the Crown Princes in KSA and the private villa for the head of the biggest architectural practice in Jeddah! There was more but I don't recall right now.

I did the whole lot without one LED in sight! They didn't exist at that point. The closest we ever got was illuminated displays on wrist watches and panel lights on dashboards! We used a lot of energy saving fluorescents, metal halide, halogen and incandescents too. The Saudis loved bright and sparkly. Chandeliers abound throughout all main areas with tons of crystal and hundreds of 25w clear candle lamps. No expense spared! It looked marvellous.

What happened next revolutionised the way we see things, literally!

Before LED made its way into any form of TV studio, theatre, event or production it spawned a whole new industry in the Architectural world. LED was born and became very popular with interior designers and architects, very quickly... once it became financially possible. Everyone had bright, blueish white LEDS blasting their retinas off, situated in every area in all new buildings. 

Then came retrofit. Then came less offensive colour temperatures. New types of light fittings. Dimmable LEDS. All along, people were saying that LEDS would be far better if they emulated the colour of Halogen lights (like those little low voltage downlights found in hundreds of ceilings throughout the world). So the lamp manufacturers tried and tried, got very close but even now, still haven't quite mastered it yet. (Work in progress in my view!)

I was extolling the benefits of LEDS well before they appeared as theatrical fixtures. Long before. No-one seemed at all a bit bothered in the early days really. What was this offensive new technology? It will never catch on! I was dubious about the way they couldn't emulate tungsten lights. Tungsten, let's face it, was always (and will always be, by its very nature) the most flexible and inofensive way of lighting the actor and scenery. It does bring out the best in everything it touches. However I was very happy to see how bright LEDs have become in such a vivid range of colours, great for concerts, musicals & of course Panto! Conversley, all these colours plus added white and amber will create pastels and quite gentle shades. (And so can tungsten, using the right filters, I'll have you know!)

But in my view and I can't be the only one, there is still a big difference between LED emulating Tungsten and Tungsten itself. I won't get into the different frequencies and spectral suff but that is mainly the problem with LED. 

It seems that the Blue LED has been made in such a way that it thrashes through all the other colours on the stage and leaves us with a noticebly blue hue over everything if we are not careful. I have mentioned this before and I am also a culprit. However we LDs must be aware that our lighting is starting to look very much like the next person's lighting. BLUE! Stop it! It does have its place, so carefully does it eh?

The TV boys & girls grabbed LED and ran with it. No more hot studios. Brighter. Low energy. Perfect. The way the colour can be corrected in general is done at the vision mixing end. Excellent! Post production in films can sort a lot out too.

But it's theatre & events I am mostly talking about here. When I light Panto now, I use mainly LED wash lights for the big colours but always add white & some other colours using tungsten halogen. It works well with the makeup and also the scenery too! Also a spot of congo blue from a nice wobbly washlight or two from the front does wonders for the cloths! There's no getting away from it! LED has its place and we LDs are happy that it's here.

I sincerely hope that Tungsten Halogen does not get lost in the dust and become one of those distant memories. It would be foolish to disgard it. I think a lot of older LDs would agree with me.

Mind you, let's not forget a cut of "Suprise Pink" in the followspots. (The older thesps among us will know what I mean!)

[Graham J McLusky. Lighting Designer] https://graham-mclusky.co.uk