Bristol · King StreetOpen bench Thu 18:00–21:00

Book a bench

ColourFilterLibrary

Lighting gels for theatre, film and events in Bristol. Test any filter under a real lamp, then take it away cut to your frame size.

TheatreFilmDanceConcertsEventsPhotography

Bristol

The housecolours

Strand Electric, London, 1930s

Strand Electric numbered its swatches in the 1930s, and its agents in New York and Sydney carried the numbers round the world. These six still turn up in swatch books today, and all six are on our shelf.

  1. No. 03Deep AmberWarmStrand number 3
  2. No. 06Primary RedSaturatedLittle light, vivid colour
  3. No. 10Middle RoseRoseStrand number 10
  4. No. 15Peacock BlueBlueFades sooner in the lamp
  5. No. 20Primary BlueBlueStrand number 20
  6. No. 39Primary GreenGreenStrand number 39

Plus correction blues and oranges, diffusion and neutral density: fifteen filters in all.

See all fifteen filters

How to ask for a filter

Order bynumber

Many makers sell a Bastard Amber, and no two pass the same light. Steel Blue is the same story. Give us the maker, the line, the number and the name, the way it goes on a lighting plan.

Written in fullRosco Cinegel #3202 Full Blue CTB

A GAMColor swatch book fanned open into a full circle of filter samples
A GAMColor swatch book. Its blues sit in the 800s, its reds in the 200s.JNT6, CC BY 3.0

Words you will hear on the bench: Bastard Amber, Steel Blue, Full CTB, Half CTO, Quarter CTO, Opal, Neutral Density, Plus Green, swatch book, burn-out, gel frame, colour scroller, profile, Fresnel, PAR can, gobo, deep-dyed, surface-coated, transmission, frost, silk.

Open bench

Every Thursday from 18:00 to 21:00 the bench is set: four lanterns, a white wall and every swatch book we stock. Bring the lantern you'll hang if you can.

Open bench

4 lamps left Thu

£122 hours

  • Thursday, 18:00–21:00
  • One lamp and every swatch book
  • Filters cut while you wait
Book a lamp

With a technician

£4890 min

  • Any weekday, booked ahead
  • Up to four lanterns at once
  • We pull your filter list before you arrive
Book a session

Cut to size

£4per cut, from

  • Any filter on the shelf, cut to your frame
  • Full 20 × 24 in sheets £11
  • Ready next working day, or posted
Send a cut list

The sheet infour numbers

Read the history of the sheet

Sheet size

Standard theatre sheet

20 × 24 in

The size of a baker's tray. Gelatin was cast on one, and the size stayed.

Material

First deep-dyed polyester

1969

Berkey Colortran's Gelatran. The same process still makes all of GAMColor.

Heat

Polyester melts at

249 °C

The highest of the modern bases. Acetate gave up when halogen lamps arrived in the late 1960s.

Scrollers

Frames on one string

2–33

A colour scroller winds a taped string of filters through the beam, cued over DMX.

Got a showcoming up?

Send us the plot, or a list of filters with frame sizes. We pull and cut them, and tell you straight away what we don't stock.