By site editor Dan Chung:
Alan Roberts is the UK’s most respected camera tester and spent a career at the BBC evaluating and creating standards. Since his retirement from the BBC he has continued to test independently and you may well have come across one of his white papers while researching your camera purchase.
At BVE we had a chance to sit down with him and discuss some very significant testing that he has been doing on lights. Dissatisfied with the old CRI index which manufacturer’s commonly quote when talking about the accuracy of lights, he set out to create a better way to evaluate different light sources. Based on research done by old colleagues at the BBC, he has created a new way to test lights and compare them scientifically.
The results of his tests are surprising and show a wide variation in the colour accuracy of different lights. His index clearly demonstrates that not all LED lights are created equal and that some well known brands don’t perform as well as expected. Watch the video above to hear Alan explain how his index works and how the rating affects the what your results look like. Fascinating stuff.
To find out how your own lights fares you check them out on Alan’s test results which can be found over on the Guild of Television cameramen’s website. You can download the full theory behind the tests from Zerb magazine here.
