Do strobes change over time?

I've had a set of Inon Z220s for about 5 years. It seems like my photos are bluer than they were a few years ago. So I need to do more post processing to get a photo that looks good to me. Do I just need to adjust my white balance, or do strobe bulbs change color over time? It seems like my photos should look better coming out of the camera than they do.

hey Jeff,

I have no idea if your bulbs turned blue (would that be a case of blue bulbs?), but do you have a raw file of a photo that seemed blue?

If you do, bring it into a raw editor.

The white balance should show (I'm guessing) 5000-5200 if you shot with a diffuser, 5300-5500 if you shot without one. If it shows a cooler temp, like 4700K, then your camera is picking too low a temp for the auto-white balance, and setting a manual kelvin temperature in camera for the white balance should solve that.

Scott

I have not heard of strobes changing in colour temperature over time. I guess it could be possible. It may just be that the photographer becomes more fussy over time.

From my tests I have found that the Inon diffusers do not alter colour temperature of the light from the strobes, the light being in the range 5500-5600K. Underwater or in any non controlled conditions the colour temperature of your lighting can be influenced by a variety of factors - UW these tend to be passage through water (which cools light) and reflection from objects in the vicinity of the photo, which in the case of, say, an orange sponge/red coral etc will significantly warm light.

Alex

After time and extensive use (and depending on storage conditions - ie whether the strobes are regularly used or operated - some can lose power. I had this happen on several SB103s after a lot of use. So I'd say that it is possible for colour shifts to occur but would suspect that it would happen over a longer period than 5 years - the 103s were over 10 years old when they started to drop in power output..

my YS 120s have done 2 or 3 thousand dives and i think they have also lost power...

Many flash tubes are coated with an amber lacquer to reduce their colour temperature. It is feasible that this lacquer gets damaged if the tube is allowed to get hot (by high frequency use) repeatedly over a period of time. Is the lacquer peeling or discoloured?

I had a z240 loose power and then die. While it was dying I couldn't figure out why it was so weak...the capacitors were fired, etc. they just put whole new guts in my case (at a fairly reasonable cost - $250), if you figure it's a new strobe.

Jack

I've had a set of Inon Z220s for about 5 years. It seems like my photos are bluer than they were a few years ago. So I need to do more post processing to get a photo that looks good to me. Do I just need to adjust my white balance, or do strobe bulbs change color over time? It seems like my photos should look better coming out of the camera than they do.

I check my strobe with a flash meter. If you keep a log, then you will notice any decrease in power. A loooong time ago, I was checking some new ikelite NiCad battery packs for Ai's and I noticed that the strobe output was less than rated. The Ai's where rated with Alikaline batteries (~1.5 VDC). NiCads are a nomial 1.2 VDC under load.

Bob

I probably have the wrong white balance set in the camera or am becoming too picky. (Last night I was flipping through the Howard Hall/Brian Skerry book critiquing all of the photos... Lower your standards dude...) I'm going to try shooting with manual white balance for a while (5500K).

Update: Setting manual white balance to 5500K was a huge improvement.