Light

Light is one of the most important things when exploring a lost place. Not only (but more importantly) it is for finding your way and your way back, to check for unsecure floor boards or valves hanging from the ceiling, but it can help your photography with nice effects depending on the light source.

Orientation Lights

Of course, I don't use my flashlights ONLY for orientation, just as I don't use my glow sitck ONLY for photographic purposes. But for me, the main purpose of a flashlight is to find my way around inside a building and be able to spot dangerous (or interesting) spots in the dark.

Don't go into a dark place without adequate lighting equipment! You'll regret it!



My Flashlight:


When it comes to flashlights, the UrbEx community is only unanimus about one thing: You need 'em! Other than that, just about everyone has their own opinion on what's best. To me, these things are important:

- Brightness: Of course, the light has to besufficiently bright.
- Battery Life: You always should have extra batteries with you, but the longer they last, the better!
- Robustness: Self-explaining :)
- Size: As an urbexer, you carry so much stuff around with you already, so the smaller, the better!

For my main flashlight, I decided for the LED Lenser P7.2. It is really bright, has a sufficiently long battery life and it is really small, but still large enough to be handled easily.

My Headlamp:


There is the rare occasion that you really do need both ands to operate equipment or have to climb in the dark and are not able to hold a flashlight in your hand. It's these cases that make a head lamp undispensible to me. Since the head lamp does not have to serve the above mentioned purposes in full - I am not talking about exploring mines!! That's a different story!! - I chose a lamp for a moderate price without relinquishing my need for brightness: the Sigma Sport Headled 5 LED.



My Searchlight:


I have this one for two reasons. First, it is perfect for walking long distances in the dark, for example wehn you're going lightpainting.

And second, the rechargeable battery lasts! You can switch between two levels of light intensity - 18 LEDs or 6 LEDs. Even in the high setting, the battery lasts for up to 12 hours and with the setting on low, you can light up the darkness for up to 48 hours.

So this is in fact a trusty companion when all your other light sources have depleted and you still have a couple of steps to go inside a bunker, dark basement or forest.

At a little more than 2lb. it's also relatively lightweight and it fits nicely into my backpack, along with all the other stuff.


Photographic Lights

As I've said, of course you can use your flashlight to light a room and sometimes I even like it better to just have the spot of the flashlight in the photo, but to me, it's also important to hava some options. Sometimes I need to light the entire room, not just a little part of it. Sometimes I want to set accents of color. There are so many possibilities to experiment with different light sources, you just have to try out for yourself what you want to take on an exploration.

Here is the stuff that's usually in my backback.



My Flood Light:


I really like basements and bunkers. But it's usually pretty dark in there, so if you want to take photos that don't show the characteristic circle of the flashlight, you need something else. I chose to get me a construction light.

These things are really bright and you can easily light a large room with them.

My lamp is a 20W LED flood light that easily lasts for 3 hours, so it's a very good addition to my arsenal of lights.

I can take off the foot and fit it easily into my backpack - together with the searchlight and all the other stuff.

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