Used Aputure Amaran Tri-8 3 Point Light Kit, Includes 2x Daylight Spot Light, 1x Bicolor Light (AB-Mount)

2018-06-14T07:15:12

Just received these yesterday. My primary uses will be for wedding videography and youtube videos. The two S lights are very powerful and surprisingly spotty (tight 25% angle). The C not quite as bright. I'd really prefer to have three S lights. I guess I could use the C as more of a backlight / hairlight where I can use a more non-daylight color balance. Everything worked great out of the box. The instruction manual is not very thorough, and is obviously translated from another language. I wanted to find out more details on charging the batteries, but the manual is vague. What I found is that you can turn the lights off, plug them into a wall outlet (with batteries attached to the lights), and you'll see an indicator that the lights are charging. I let them charge overnight - though they were certainly not low on charge - and this morning, all the indicators on the back of the light were just off. I guess that's how you know they are fully charged... the indicator just goes away (?). These lights have the look and feel of a very high quality product. Everything very solid. If possible, I'll update this review after I've had a chance to use them for a couple weddings and some youtube videos.

Jerry M.

2017-12-20T08:52:04

For the money, this is the absolute best option for my video needs. I shoot overhead product shots and to-camera talking heads. Cost, space savings, color accuracy, power, controllability are great. Likes: These lights take up half the space of a standard bowens mount-style head. I can fit these into cramped spaces better than my old lights. The output is really nice as well. My set up is generally shooting at 200 ISO, around f 2.8, 1/60 and the light can be at 100% power at a meter away as a key light. Shooting with a closed down aperture (f8-f16), you'd need to double up on the lights possibly. Good thing there are 3 of them. Dislikes: The mount for each light is cheap plastic, so get a manfrotto (but keep the included stud). It takes a while to set up each head with the EZ Box because the arms are annoying to attach. The plastic rods are flared out from being cut, so you need to shave off some plastic or jam it in. The diffusion is kind of a joke. If you want soft light that wraps around the subject, leave it off and use a shoot-through umbrella. It's nice Aputure offers this softbox idea, but it's too small. Lastly, the bi-color is a little off. When it's set for 5600k, it still seems a bit warm compared to the daylight balanced heads. I set the bi-color to 5900k to better match. Overall, this is perfect for the money. I'm thinking of investing in the 300d to complete my light kit. I think that and the trial-8 will have a massive impact on my work.

William S.