Color Meters are an essential tool for all DOP (Directors of Photography) and for the lighting technicians or light producers.
Nowadays Color Meters are know as Spectrometers since they are able to check and measure all the spectral infos about the lights on your set. Indeed today is much more relevant to learn about spectral data than color temperature. This is because the modern LED lighting let you virtually replicate any kind of light source.
A killing application can be the following one: with a spectrometer you can measure the light spectrum that you have today on your set, memorize it and tomorrow you can set-up your light source XY coordinates to replicate the same lighting condition.
Light manufacturers need a Spectrometer to fine tune their products and to check the achieved performances in term of CRI and TLCI.
With a Spectrometer DOP can mix their light equipments in a set balancing and choosing the right color gels in a snapshot.
Sekonic C-7000 Spectrometer
The Sekonic C-7000 Spectrometer is a portable handheld spectrometer, designed especially for industrial use. Utilizing Sekonic’s CMOS linear image sensor design and large touch-screen color display, the C-7000 can measure and accurately describe LED, HMI, fluorescent, as well as natural light and electronic flash. The C-7000’s Utility software displays memorized data in several ways and outputs spectral data in 1nm/5nm (nanometer) increments in CSV format. The C-7000 is an important measuring tool for quality control in lamp manufacturing, medical facilities, educational / office safety and health standards, agricultural lighting / design and many more industrial uses.
Sekonic C-800 Spectrometer
The Sekonic C-800 Spectrometer is a full-spectrum color meter that can precisely measure every kind of light including LED HMI Fluorescent and electronic flash. Its high-resolution measuring system featuring CMOS sensor enables capturing spikes in light source output to provide unsurpassed color measurement accuracy. Different than any spectrometer today the C-800’s direct display of values for major light source and lens filter brands simplifies correcting and modifying light color for cleaner recording and faster post process.
The New C-800 has CRI, TLCI, TLMF, TM-30-18, and CRI. Currently, the only meter to have SSI (Spectral Similarity Index) developed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science and Technology Council. Now you can compare and score lights based upon their spectral similarity.
With the C-800 matching the new generation of RGB, RGBW and RGBAW LED’s has never been easier. The meter will give you any lights (x, y) values to measure precise chromaticity coordinates, and you can measure Hue and Saturation to get the best match from any RGB LEDs. Now matching your LEDs to any available light source, gelled or not, can now be done in seconds.