I am hoping that 2012 will be the year that cheap LED fresnels hit the market.

I'll try to post more info in coming days.

@jaecjaec
That looks like a nice kit, anyone familiar with the brand? Good quality? Original Arris cost a lot more than that! I wouldn't mind owning the 650 kit. Very versatile, free shipping, just need some scrims.

@CFreak
Actually you can make open face tungstens work -- you need to get some cinema foil and snoot them down. Shape the light. It's not ideal, and it can be time consuming, but you can make them work. Fresnels are way way way better, but you pay way way way more.

@jaecjaec
You can get a dimmer and experiment with your normal light bulb :-)
Generally, it is large. Color temperature drop with dimming, color quality don't drop.
So, if you dim all the lights at same level and white balance all will be ok.

@CFreak if I were you, I'd get that 312 LED bi-color light deal.

-Thanks for the recommendation.

I get all my lights from www.coollights.biz. They are top notch and fairly inexpensive. I personally wouldn't go anywhere else.

The bigger the fresnel lens, the better.... That means big and cumbersome, but the lights is nice and even.

I have used many tungsten fresnel lamps and even naked (no diffusion, direct on the subject) they produce a pleasing even, direct, hard light, which is the movie industry standard when hard light is desired. They are also really inefficient, pulling a lot of amps and creating a lot of heat.

Avoid the open face tungsten lights as much as possible, the naked direct light is unpleasant, lacking the evenness and focus of the fresnel version, they are cheaper and really only good for bouncing into something else. Likewise the led lights suffer similarly, they only look "ok" when there is a piece of diffusion in front of them.

HMI fresnels naked produce a harsher light, if you are looking closely. HMIs only come with a piece of glass to absorb the excessive (and retina damaging) UV rays they produce. Their 5600 Kelvin temperature makes them a must to use for Day/Exterior.

For everything else: Day/Int, Night/Int, Night/Ext, the movie industry uses tungsten fresnels. When possible and for day interior gel your windows with CTO. If someone is walking from indoors to outdoors daytime, HMIs must be used. There are exceptions of course, where hard light is not needed, then the whole Kino Flo look has its' place.

Personally, I only own an old Inky (mini mole) 200 watt, which is really only good for a night interior and lighting something small (and shooting test charts), I also own a few Sima led lights, which get the job done as an on camera fill light for run and gun interviews, but, are 4500 Kelvin and have some green in them. My flexfill is a life saver if you have another source nearby you want to bounce. For bigger productions I have the production rent lights. For my small doc work, I was looking at the z96 awhile back, but, all the led on lights seem to suffer from the same harsh light malaise.

The dimmable, color temp variable leds look interesting too. Let us know how they perform :-)

I'm looking for a new light primarily for indoor use. I could use my LED lights at 3200K to match with Fresnel light temperature.

Did you get a set of Fresnels? Are you using dimmer? Can you give me more info about "Film Gear" Fresnel? Just for reference. Thanks.

And get a full refund for the Comet copy LED. Otherwise I will be like the Angry Birds... "Vengeance is mine!!!"

LED fleshlight... hmmm...

Let me read more about video lighting first.

Mainly for a portrait. I've been using two LED lights. Z96 as fill light. CL-LED256 as key light. I need 3rd light for back light that can also do focused lighting.

Sounds like Fresnel light wouldn't be a good choice for me. Have you guys tried focus lighting from LED light source? Sorta snoot like feature from strobist.

>Have you guys tried out any Fresnel light in the market?

Never owned one (and do not plan), just tried somethign similar to your Jeitu.

>What's your opinion about it compared to LED light?

It is hot. Light quality is better, but no 5500K, of course.
You can adjust spot size and barn doors, so quite thin line of light is possible.
Dimming has serious issues (color temperature drops). It is same on any tungsten light.
Some guys love them, some not.
If you are shooting people you are better use something else, as it project IR also making people faces hot and you'll see result of this soon.