Anyone setting up a TV studio is best advised to see lighting as an evolving art. With the emergence of ever more highly-defined pictures, lighting engineers must ensure that their systems can accommodate all the latest trends. Then there are energy issues. Do you pay significantly more for a fluorescent system, which will cut electricity costs in the long run? Or do you opt for the more traditional system, to keep the startup budget down? Never, for example, install an air conditioning system without consulting the lighting specialist, the experts tell MEB Journal.  

MARWAN TARRAF
Manager, Darkside - Lebanon
A major problem with studios in Lebanon and other parts of the region is a lack of professionalism and planning, according to Marwan Tarraf. “They don’t draw maps of where their lights are going to be or plan out what kind of lighting they’re going to have,” he says. “Studios here are very basic shooting spaces. People don’t pay attention to the appropriate height, or consider lights that can be operated by remote control like people do in big studios.” Tarraf suggests hiring a professional lighting supplier rather than relying on producers and rental companies. “They conduct an overview of the site and decide what kind of lighting is needed and at what intensity, and so on. If I wanted to set up a really professional studio, I would seek help from a foreign specialized company. If you have a 1,000-1,500m² studio, those are the kinds of people you need.” Expect to spend at least $300,000 for a 1,000m² studio, he says: “That would give you open-faces, fresnels, tungsten and soft lights. You would also get moving-heads. You could, on a 1,000m² studio go crazy, and spend a million dollars,” he says.

DAVID SERDIMET
Director, Balcar lighting suppliers - France
David Serdimet champions the developing field of fluorescent lighting: “You can get a wide range of cost and energy-efficient solutions,” he says, recommending a mix of both flux and spot fixtures. Flux lighting is designed to ensure an even spread of light throughout the studio, while fluorescent spot lighting provides a narrower angle. “You can get nice shadows and control the light as you would with a regular tungsten light. The two together create a cost-efficient lighting solution for pretty big studios.” He says a fluorescent spot flux can now be purchased for the same price as a good-quality fresnel. Yet a fluorescent solution could cost up to $500,000 for demanding clients and Serdimet admits that not all studio proprietors have been won over. Whether fluorescent or regular, today lighting is all about evenness and control, he explains, especially given the advent of digital TV. “With the arrival of digital and high-definition TV you get a picture with more lines and points. So traditionally-lit studios are not going to be able to provide the same results; they will have to redo the lighting, and doing so with fluoresecent lighting is going to be easier than with tungsten or fresnels.” Rising energy costs may also help boost the use of energy-saving fluoresecent solutions: “One of the big budgets in studios is for electricity.”

RAPH JANSSENS
Sales Manager, ADB – Belgium
Janssens sees ceramic lighting as the latest trend: “It fits in better and has a spectrum which is very comparable to fluoresecent lighting, so the two can be used together.”
He too stresses the need to adapt for the digital revolution. “Going digital means more light,” he explains. “The cameras get better. There’s more to see, because it’s wide image. Your height stays the same, but you get a twenty percent wider image. More light is needed to give the picture definition and quality because the camera sees so much more. Over the last five or six years we worked with an average of 800 Watts per square meter but now we’re back to values over 1,200 Watts. That means more light, more wattage, more warmth. With the wider image the lighting has to keep the anchor as the point of concentration, but within a wider field; and the image has to be nice. That’s the new difficulty.”
What’s more, prices are “unfortunately” not rising, says Janssens. “Contrary to the electronics of the television world, lighting is not following the price curve,” he says. “When I started 28 years ago, the price of one dimmer channel was about two and a half times the price of today. People are still spending as much money only because they are using more lighting,” he said. For example, a 400m² studio 25 years ago had 120 channels—now it has 240 or 300 channels, he explained. Thus, instead of using a few big light sources, studios often deploy several small, more-dramatic, better-defined fixtures to enhance images. While a one kilowatt fresnel is priced at around 650 euros, a 220 Watt fluorescent light, which gives the same light output over the same surface, will cost about two and a half times that price. “If you want to save energy, if you want to save warmth on the characters, you initially spend more money. But over three or four years you’ll have that paid back on energy savings,” he says, adding that lighting usually accounts for 10-12 percent of total spending on a broadcast.

NICK MOBSBY
Projects Director, LSI Projects Ltd., UK
Nick Mobsby, author of Lighting Systems for Television Studios, says the trend toward downsizing studios is encouraging smaller, ‘cool’ lighting solutions. “You see people trying to convert their office into ‘the news for Dubai.’ They’re trying to convert offices into a proper broadcast space. This results in reduced height and then you end up having to develop lighting solutions that are cool, small and lightweight.”
Replacing tungsten fill-light with cool fluorescent lighting has become a trend across the Gulf in recent years, he says, leading to a 50 percent reduction in the weight of a typical broadcast environment. “Meanwhile camera technology is allowing us to go down quite significantly in terms of intensity, compared to even five years ago. So what was a 2,000K light is now a 650K or 1,000K. We’re seeing a halving of the electrical power and a halving of the air conditioning requirements.” However the trend in smaller studios is not confined to the Arab world: “The BBC for example must have converted more ‘broom cupboards’ than anybody else,” whereas, “Dubai TV have built a most wonderful new center a bit like the new Sky one in London.” Mobsby says a new 120m² sports studio just went on air in Dubai at a lighting cost of more than $250,000, while a station in Jordan, with an 800m², a 400m² and a 200m² studio, is spending almost $1.8 million in lighting. Britain’s Sky News, on the other hand, is spending almost $400,000 on a high-definition 150m² studio, he says.
Still, many studio lighting systems in the Gulf remain unprepared for HD television, he warns. “They need more hanging positions for the luminaires, and more luminaires, but of a lower wattage, so they get a bigger coverage.”
Mobsby is skeptical about complete fluorescent solutions. “You cannot, in my view, light solely with cool light,” he says. “It makes the picture just completely flat. You must have a mixture with tungsten. I’ve seen lots of cases where the manufacturers have sold a cool light solution only for the buyers to come back and say the person on camera has disappeared because the image is so flat. To get a nice defined picture with a nice contrast you need a mixture.”
Height, Mobsby stresses, is the most important lighting factor in any studio. “You need at least three and a half meters of clear space underneath the lights to make them work properly.”
He also advises securing an adequate power supply and last but not least, consulting a lighting expert before installing the air conditioning system. Otherwise, you could find yourself down to two and a half meters height, with little room for the lighting. “Out here in the Gulf that is one of the major failings. They believe they can do it themselves. They go as far as putting all the air conditioning in and then they think about putting in the lighting.”  “In Lebanon, you don’t have huge professional studios,” says Marwan Tarraf, manager of Lebanon’s Darkside production house. “That’s why there’s not much of a plan when people equip their studios.
There’s a bigger area not only to light but to fill in with content.
“In fact, in lighting, the price per individual product is coming down over the years, not going up.
“I would say that for the moment the Gulf is slightly better off,” he states.
I know that in Jordan there’s a new station I’m working on which has three studios. .

Terms of Reference
Luminaire: A complete lighting unit
Fresnel spotlight: Luminaires that produce an even, soft-edged beam of light through a Fresnel lens.
Tungsten halogen: A family of lamps which give an almost constant color temperature. 
Open-faced luminaire: Luminaries with no lens system.
Softlite: Any fixture that utilizes the principle of indirect illumination.
Filler Light: Controls shade areas. Usually a softlite but can be a controlled hard light.
Color Temperature: Measures the color of a light source in degrees Kelvin (K). True white is about 3,500K, lower color temperatures are called "warm white" and appear reddish, and higher color temperatures are called "cool white" and appear bluish.