Thread: Lighting question - Par 38

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So now that I know what difficulties I can expect for next year, as it relates to lighting, I was curious if any of you use can lights like these:



I noticed that the few lights that I used were a bit distracting because you could see the bulb. So I thought maybe going this route or something similar with a barn door attachment would be a good idea.

What do you guys think? There's someone selling 4 of these on ebay with lights and gels for $40.00 (plus shipping) and would grab them if they're a good way to go.

When you mean people see the are you talking about that they are facing the light and it shines in their eyes?.

I use chauvet colorsplash jr for mine and Then just put a tube over them to "hide" the light where needed.

Hi, I have the par 38 since I play music in bands. When I set up my lightning this year. I tried my regular bulbs that were in them. They wouldn't cover a large enough area for me. Tried some different strobes. I also have a photo light I tried. Then I tried my regular flood lights fro the house. We went with the regular floods because it wasn't so blinding. The lightning took on a yellowish color. But so dose some real lightning. I put it on top of my roof so it would light up my tree line and back yard. The photo bulbs kept causing reflections on my plexi for some of my video props.If you are lighting a small area the cans will make a big difference, because of the control. They come with the standard gel holder that cuts their range. But you can get other holders to cut them to a even smaller area. Or for Lightning, you could leave the gel holder off to cover a larger area. Remember the 38 cans or made for stage use. So each one I would say they are meant to throw light 30 feet as a back ground or 15 feet as a effect. For a Blue stage color on a 15 x 30 ft stage we would use 4 of the par 38's. I am getting ready to order some led bulbs for next year. That way I hope to cut some of the glare from looking in them and get a whiter light. The color Splash will cover a lot better area, but your control is very limited. Only the distance from the area is your control. But they make a great wash.

Par cans are a bit bright as mentioned above and depending on where or how you are going to be using them it might create to much of a over wash unless they are DMX controllable or you use them with a dimmer pack and you can fade them. So just how will you be using them? There is also this flood light hack you might be interested in. Do a search here for floodlight baffles. It makes standard flood light holders look like par cans.

Another thing you need to be aware of is power because a par 38 cans use 150w bulbs which pulls 1.25 amps or 5 amps for all 4. That is a lot of power so if you are using them in a residential setting and you do not have much power to work with you might overload a circuit especially if you are using them with a fog machine i.e. a 1200w machine that pulls 10 amps. So between these 4 lights and a 1200w machine you are maxing a 15 amp circuit which is standard in most residential homes. So you need to keep this in mind and make sure you have the power to run them and everything else in your haunt.

Here is that thread.... Some use those plastic plant pots, others use 2 gallon paint cans.

Floodlight Baffles