Figure 1-12.
Scrim
5. Now that we have discussed the equipment used to control the direction of a
beam, let us take a look at how we can control the intensity or brightness of
lighting. The simplest way to control the intensity of lighting is to use only
the minimum number of lighting instruments needed to light the set area.
However, minimizing the lighting instruments is not always enough.
a. Another technique used to control light intensity is to use scrims, not
only as light diffusers, but also to reduce light intensity. There are also
thin wire mesh screens that are put in front of lighting instruments, much the
same as scrims, to reduce the light output (intensity) without influencing the
color temperature of the light.
b. The dimmer is the most flexible of the different light intensity
control devices as it allows easy manipulation of each lighting instrument, or
a group of lighting instruments, to burn at a given intensity from zero (off
position) to full strength.
(1) Although dimmers are technically quite complex, their basic
operational principle is quite simple; by allowing more or less current to flow
to the lamp, the lamp burns as a higher or lower intensity.
(2) It can be argued that dimmers are not always useful for reducing
light intensity. If the current to a lamp is reduced by more than 10 percent,
the color temperature of the illumination emitted from that lamp is changed
along with the light intensity.
You will remember, that as the color
temperature of a light source is reduced, the illumination from that light
source begins to emit a reddish tint.
Therefore, color temperature must be
considered when using the dimmer to reduce light intensity.
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