2019-10-03T09:52:26
Rated 4 out of 5
Much, much better than I thought
I've already purchased 4 of the smaller CLAR on-camera (NP-F style) led panels. I like those but they definitely do not put out enough power or light coverage. At the time of purchase, Adorama offered these at a SUBSTANTIAL sale price. Picked up 1 at first to test. Then ordered a 2nd one immediately after the first test.
Pros:
1. Build quality is good
2. Light output and brightness is good
3. User interface is good (easy to use/learn)
4. Fanless cooling design so It's quiet for video shoots
5. TURBO mode is great for that short burst of power when needed
6. Power adapter/console adds ability to run V-mount battery if needed
7. Includes small softbox
8. Built-in metal barndoors
Cons:
1. Lacking accessories
2. Included softbox is a hassle to install/remove. Hate the softbox design
3. Power adapter/console needs a light stand mount. Hanging it from the large lanyard swings around when you need to move the light and too large to hang over light stand lock knobs
No question, these are beyond great value for the money at the time I bought these on sale. Not quite 5-stars, but close. I'm primarily a stills photographer but dabble a little in Video work. As a photographer, I will utilize these for my film photography projects. These will serve as interview style video work.
Dat M.
2019-09-20T22:37:27
Rated 5 out of 5
Great deal
Outstanding quality build. Very bright
DAROLD O.
2019-09-11T08:35:57
Rated 4 out of 5
unbeatable for this price
Its well build and kinda heavy. You can’t use it without the Softbox as you see jagged shadows because the leds are spread to far out. Bouncing into a wall or putting diffusion directly onto the panel so that I can use the Barndorrs to shape the light will do it. I like the output and bi color option and with the soft box you can get good looking soft shadows
Sofia N.
2019-03-08T10:05:24
Rated 2 out of 5
You can see leds on whatever your lighting
Not a smooth output, its bright but you can see the led size on whatever your lighting
JEREMY A.
2019-02-08T13:07:10
Rated 4 out of 5
Overall good value
A fairly solid panel. My only complaint would be that there is no color temperature adjustment in turbo mode.
Charles A.
2018-10-31T10:02:30
Rated 4 out of 5
Great in many ways, poor design in others
I'm giving this four stars because, even though it did not quite live up to my expectation, it really is much better than many products in the same price range and/or more expensive.
This light is similar in many ways to the Aputure Light Storm LS-1, but is several hundred dollars cheaper and has a few differences.
The color quality appears excellent to my eye.
PROs:
- Fantastic light quality
- Reasonably bright
- bi-color
- comes with bag
- comes with softbox
- softbox is very easy to setup and packs down super small (almost the size of a coffee cup saucer)
- currently bundled with free v-mount battery (charger sold separately)
- nice having controls & battery separate from light in instances where light is high up and and adjustments need to be made, or battery changed.
- fairly small and compact compared to brightness
- Dims to 1% - this is a fantastic ability that the Aputure Light Storm doesn't have (minimum for LS is 10%)
CONs:
- Must use with softbox, because with out it, shadows look stair-stepped and horrible because the LEDs are spaced too far apart.
- Can't change color temperature for turboboost (forced to use 4800 (ish) kelvin)
- Cool-down period limits the usefulness of turboboost (10 minute cool down for every 1 minute run)
- Zipper on bag ripped first time I zipped it
- Two out of four Velcro tabs on softbox ripped off after 1 day of use
In more detail:
This light is great and extremely good value for the price, but has a few pitfalls.
The main one is that the LEDs are spaced very far apart. This means when you point the light at something, you have to be very careful or the shadows it creates will have a pixelated "stair step" fall-off from the multitude of LED bulbs. This is more noticeable with this light than any other LED panel light I have used. Bouncing the light, or using the included softbox takes care of this problem, and the end result is a nice, softish, high quality light. Just know that, in my opinion, it is almost mandatory to use the softbox with it. The Aputure Light Storm does not have this issue as the LEDs are very tightly packed in alternating rows. Sometimes it is nice to be able to use a small panel light like this without having to bulk it up with a softbox.
The turboboost feature on this light seems interesting in theory, but in practice does not really seem practical. The light must cool down for 10 seconds for every 1 second it runs in turboboost. If you run it for it's maximum 60 second boost, that means it will be in cool down mode for 10 minutes! If you're lighting a scene or something and depending on the Turbo boost feature, this just seems like a strange way to work. Also, when in turbo boost, you have NO control of color temperature. It cranks both blue and orange LEDs to maximum. It does not state in the manual anywhere what color temperature this is. My guess is somewhere around 4800k. This fact, and the long cool down period make the uses for this feature very limited. But hey, it's there. You can use it or not.
Poor Accessory Quality: The bag and the soft box are very poor quality. The zipper of the bag I received ripped the first time I put something in it and zipped it up. A big 5 to 6 inch rip. The softbox is handy, but one of the four hook & loop straps that are sewn to it, and used to secure it to the light, was dangling by a single thread when I opened the package. Another one ripped off the first day I actually used the light. The straps wouldn't be hard to sew back on. Fixing the zipper would be much harder.
This is in no way a deal breaker, but the specs for this light makes it seem like it is much brighter than the Aputure LS-1. I haven't compared the bi-color versions side by side, but have used both and the difference, if any, is negligible.
The Aputure LS-1 has a straight vertical yoke. The angled yoke of the Luxpando improves on that design a little by allowing a little more room for tilting, but doesn't do as much as I had hoped if the side barn doors are open.
Personally, I bought three with high hopes. I ended up keeping one, because it's still useful, and I have already used it on a few jobs, but returned the other two because it's not as useful as I'd like. It's really not a bad light, but not having to worry about stair-stepping on the shadow edges would make it absolutely great.
Also, if anyone is curious, I purchased a pack of LEE Filters Zircon Gels because the zircon gels are supposed to directly address the stair-stepping issue. They help a little, but they work better when not held directly against the LEDs. Clipping the diffusion to the barn doors works (and I assume most other diffusion would, too), but I was hoping I could affix them to the light and just leave the gels on semi-permanently.
Tristan C.
