HMI & Tungsten Lights

Here is how this works in practice. HMI and tungsten inventory in Italy is held principally by Panalight Rome and Milan, Stop-Service for lighting and grip, Cinecittà Rental on the Tuscolana campus, and Lumiq Studios in Turin, with Movie People in Naples, EM srl, and Cargo Studios Bologna filling regional gaps when a feature day stretches across multiple territories.

Here is the short of it. Our rental team books the full ARRI M-series from M8 through M90, K5600 Joker and Alpha fixtures (Joker2 800, 1600, Alpha 4K, Alpha 9K, Alpha 18K), ARRI T-series tungsten Fresnels from 150W Pepper through 20K Wendy, Mole-Richardson Big Eye Tens, Baby Junior 2Ks, and the 12K and 18K Mole Molepar units that productions still call for on Cinecittà Studio 5 and the Mediaset stages in Cologno Monzese.

Here is the breakdown. Daylight conversion runs hard in the Mediterranean summer — interiors against the Sicilian sun blast at Noto and Modica or the harsh Amalfi reflectance demand 18K and 12K HMIs blasted through 12x12 and 20x20 frames — and tungsten remains the workhorse for Centro Storico interiors, Florence palazzi, the Vatican-adjacent shoots, and the on-power-only kit needs at heritage sites like Pompei and Herculaneum where Soprintendenza restrictions limit cabling routes and ground anchors.

Here is what that looks like on the ground. Each fixture is bench-tested under load at the warehouse, with electronic ballast cycles run, lamp hours logged on the ARRI EB and K5600 ballasts, dimmer curves logged on the DMX and Art-Net boards, and tungsten globes checked against the dimmer curve and the gaffer's plot before the trucks roll out for the call.

Here is how the picture comes together. Italian gaffers and best boys from the long-running Cinecittà and Lumiq pools work alongside our team on load calculations, generator sizing — typically Pramac, FB Group, SDMO, or Multiquip silent gensets staged for HMI runs that exceed the ready mains tie-in at locations such as Lambrate stages, Cinque Terre cliffside, or the Sicilian baroque streets — and CCNL Cinema Audiovisivo crewing terms with ENPALS and INAIL safety paperwork filed before the first call.

Here is what we have to work with. ZTL access for Rome's Centro Storico, the narrow lanes of Florence, the marble piazze of Lecce, and the cliff-top hairpins above the Amalfi coast is handled by our location office with reduced-footprint vans and pre-cleared permits set up with city police. The 24-hour swap cycle out of Rome and Milan keeps replacement Pars, Fresnels, ballasts, lamps, header cables, and Bates feeder on the shelf for shoot-day damage and last-minute additions, with the Italian Cinema Plan 40% rebate records moving through MiC channels in parallel.