LED Video Lights Are Here - FloLights 500LED
by: Bill Pryor

Until recently, LED lights seemed to be either a toy, decoration or interesting novelty. Initially too expensive and weak for practical applications, LED's have grown in capability as the price has come down to the point they're starting to find their way into practical
use. With bulb life measured in thousands of hours and generating very little heat, LED's have found their way into flashlights,
taillights, flashers and just about any application where durability is required. That practical application now includes film and
video lighting. Today FloLights http://www.FloLights.com have brought the LED into that market with their reasonably priced
500LED lights. At $450 (shipping and stand are extra) they are about half the price of Lowel's Caselight 2, and only about $100
more than Coollights' equivalent fluorescent.

Several years ago when Lowel came out with their Caselights, I was an early user. I had seen the Kino Flo Diva lights at NAB and
was interested in three of those. But when I saw the Caselights, I thought they were a better light for less money. I liked the idea of everything, even the stand, folding up into a self-contained case. They were, and still are, very handy (although the stand is very
undersized for the Caselight 4).

I bought a set of three Caselights--two Caselight 2s and one Caselight 4 fluorescents for a production house I used to work for.
They were purchased mainly for shooting location interviews, but soon I found myself using them in many other applications.
Fluorescents don't generate much heat and require very little power. The days of blowing circuits in people's offices are a thing
of the past when you light with flos. An added bonus: You can switch between daylight and tungsten by changing bulbs. By using
daylight lamps in these three fluorescents and renting three or four HMIs, I've shot complete productions, perhaps adding a fresnel
on occasion with CTB (CTB is the designation for daylight blue gel used for balancing tungsten with daylight) for a background light
when more lights were needed.

I've also done a lot of chroma key talking head narrator shoots with fluorescents. I key with one at 180 degrees to the side, fill with
another and use the third for an eyelight up high and over the camera. A 300 watt fresnel makes a backlight, and a couple of
Lowel DPs with 750 watt lamps light the green screen. Narrators, especially for long teleprompter sessions, really like the flos
because they run so cool.

A couple of months ago I set out to buy a set of three fluorescents for myself. I settled on FloLights and had decided to get three
of the 2-bulb systems because the 4-bulb Caselight was pretty heavy and I rarely needed that much power for interviews and
smaller setups that I do a lot. I could always pull a smaller light in closer.

But after I had read all about the FloLight fluorescents, I ended up back on their main page and scrolled down to find...almost
by accident...the LEDs.

They look much like the fluorescents, with 4-way barn doors and easy vertical or horizontal mounting. They are, however,
significantly smaller and lighter in weight. The new models work off DC power if that interests you. If not they come with
AC power supplies.

This photo shows the top and camera left barn doors reflecting, while the right and lower doors are angled out more and don't
reflect as much. I didn't measure the difference, but my guess is the reflecting probably amplifies the light by about 1/4 stop.
Fluorescents which have mirrored barn doors, versus these pebbled ones, can add up to about half a stop.

The reason I'm comparing these new lights with fluorescents is because lots of videographers now use fluorescents quite a bit
as I do, and the LEDs are just about as revolutionary today as fluorescents became when Kino Flo and Lowel started making
them a few years ago. When I unpackaged the first LED, I was impressed by the build quality but even more impressed by the
compactness and light weight. The lights are very well constructed and have horizontal and vertical mounting devices with big
handles. They tighten down nicely and hold the light in place with no need to use excessive force.

So how to they compare with their fluorescent equivalents? First, the 500LED (www.FloLight.com/500LED.htm) is 14" long, which
makes a little over half the height of a Caselight. It is 8" wide, just a little wider than the Caselight. And it is thinner by probably
1"-2". There are four barn doors instead of two, and you don't have to take them off and flip them over if you don't want
reflectors--just rip off the velcro-attached pebble reflectors. I would prefer that the reflectors be smooth and mirrored like Lowel's.
These pebble reflectors help some but not all that much. However, because of the more focused beam and less falloff of the LEDs,
they are slightly brighter than the 2-bulb fluorescents with reflectors positioned for maximum amplification.

The fluorescents are true soft lights. They put out a nice, even, broad light that requires no diffusion unless you choose to knock down
the intensity. The 500LEDs are somewhere between a soft light and a hard light. On the studio shoot I completed recently there was
no need for diffusion, though I did cut the front fill light down by switching off one of the LED banks. If I'm going to light an interview in,
say, a small office where the key would be only 5-10 feet from the subject, I probably would use some light diffusion, such as opal
or the Lee 228, which I like better. I like the fact that the LEDs are more directional which can be quite useful at times, and they are
bright enough so they can be diffused for a total soft light look if I want that.

If you use fresnels you know how, if you position the light 10-15 feet from a wall on full flood, you'll get a round pattern with clearly
defined edges. With a fluorescent, you don't really see any edges. With the 500LED, you get a soft oval pattern with edges, but very
soft edges. In other words, this light would fall somewhere between a full soft light and a fresnel, though the fresnel obviously has
a much longer throw. I haven't done a side-by-side comparison, but I'm guessing that if I cut a piece of Lee 205, put it in the filter
holder right in front of the lens on a 650 watt Altman fresnel, I'd get a very similar look to the 500LED, in terms of pattern and focus.

One comparison I did make was with a Caselight 2. I set my light meter at an arbitrary ISO 200, 1/60 sec., and placed the Caselight
right next to the LED, turning them on and off one at a time. My distance was 8-10 feet. The Caselight 2 gave me a reading of f2.1.
The 500LED was f2.9. In other words, there was nearly a stop difference. Then I adjusted the Caselight barn doors to the reflecting
position and got an f2.6. So the difference with the reflecting barn doors working is there, but nothing to write home about. In other
words, the 500LEDs have less falloff than the equivalent fluorescents but not enough so you'd choose one over the other if that's
your only requirement. If you have a 2-bulb fluorescent that does not have mirrored barn doors, then that near 1-stop difference
could be significant.

The 500LED pulls only 40 watts. I find that truly amazing. This means it's possible to run three of them off a battery, easily. Do the
math--120 watts, slightly more than the household lamp beside my desk. For shooting in a vehicle, their lack of heat and compact
size make it easy for an assistant to hand-hold one. Or, you could prop it up on the dash with a beanbag. The lack of heat opens
up options for confined spaces not available to older style lights.

I did not have my colour temperature meter with me on the shoot, so I didn't check the 5600K, but it's a good guess it really is 5600K.
The light looks a lot like an HMI. I think the daylight fluorescents I've used are either 5200 or 5600. Unlike daylight fluorescents,
the LED lights require no warmup time. You turn them on, and they're on instantly. Daylight fluorescents can take 2 or 3 minutes
sometimes, although tungsten bulbs get up to speed significantly faster.

Some people may think the 5600K of the LEDs is a disadvantage, because you can't switch out bulbs as you can with fluorescents.
For me this is not an issue because I've been shooting mostly daylight for quite some time now. For some reason the cameras I use
just look better under daylight than tungsten. In mixing light sources with daylight fluorescents, nearly all the time I would gel the
tungsten lights rather than switch out the fluorescent bulbs because it's a lot faster and easier. Some fluorescents may be better
than Lowel in this regard, but Caselights are all I've used (except for the smaller Kinos in vehicles), and they have some very
funky latches to deal with when you want to change bulbs. My guess is that FloLights are better in this regard.

This production still is a little bit faked. The far left light is in its as-used position, the other two have been moved so you can see
them better. Notice that the middle one has been dimmed down and the left one is on full. Each light has 4 switches on the back,
and each switch toggles on or off a bank of LEDs.

Here are all 3 500LED lights set up together, with the center one still dimmed. Notice that the one on the right is mounted vertically.
You can see the 4 individual bank switches, as well as the green main power switch. The small AC power supply can be seen in
the floor just below the vertically-mounted light. The XLR connecting cable is long enough so the power supply can be on the floor
without dangling, and a shorter AC cable makes the run to the electrical outlet. The cables disconnect from the power supply.
They come packaged with the lights in heavy zip lock plastic bags, handy for keeping the cables together, but I've ordered some
small canvas bags to hold them.

At this point I'm carrying the 500LEDs--all three of them, separated by bubblewrap--in a $12.95 canvas bag that's 12" wide
19" long and 11" tall, from www.vtarmynavy.com . That's a great place to buy bags, by the way. Not camera bags, but you can
usually find a nice heavy duty bag for many items at a much lower cost than you'd think. I've ordered another "Tactical Cargo Bag"
and will get some dense gray camera case foam and keep two lights in one bag and one light plus cords in the other. All three
fit standing on edge like in the photo, but it'll be easier to get them in and out if I use two bags. I also ordered some small
6"X5"X5" canvas bags for 6 bucks apiece to store the power supplies and their cables.

Overall, I can say I'm a happy convert from fluorescents to LEDs. These lights should last for 30,000-40,000 hours, which probably
means the rest of my productive life. I've used a set of fluorescents for about 6 or 7 years now and have never had a bulb burn out,
and they're rated at 10,000 hours.

There is no one perfect light for everything, and just as fluorescents won't replace open face or fresnel hard lights, LEDs probably
will not replace fluorescents. For example, if I needed to light a bigger studio setup and wanted to do it with cool lights, I'd get some
of the bigger FloLights fluorescent fixtures.

To quote Steve Jobs, there's one more thing...stands. FloLights sells a good quality light stand for $60. That's just under half of what
the equivalent Lowel stand costs. They are heavier duty than I expected--well beyond what's needed for the weight of the 500LEDs
or heavier fluorescents--and they're spring loaded. They're also black, so those times I've had to pull out the black gaffer tape to hide
a light stand reflection are a thing of the past with this setup. The lockdowns hold position without excessive tightening, and the
base spreads out wider than most stands of this size, for greater stability.

And yet one more thing, again...dealing with FloLights. You get on the website, read up on the items and give the guys a call on the telephone to discuss them and/order--the old fashioned way. People are knowledgeable, friendly and happy to go out into the
warehouse and look at something if they can't answer your question immediately. I'd give them a good solid "A" in customer service, friendliness and product knowledge. For me, it's always worth a little more money to deal with people who know something about production and want to be of assistance, and in this case, you don't pay more for that privilege. In fact, you pay much less than if you
buy certain better known competitive brands.

On the evening I was sitting around waiting on the late UPS delivery, I commented to a friend, "I've never bought a set of lights
without seeing them in person. These are either going to be totally fantastic...or I screwed up royally." I'm pleased to say it's the
former and not the latter.

In addition to the studio shoot I did a location shoot today in a truck dealer parts department. The 500LEDs performed as expected
with no problems. The shots included various retail displays, a salesman and customer talking, a person at a computer, and a
person stocking shelves. (No photos of the setup available.)

One thing came up in the location shooting that is not an issue in a typical studio shoot. Within a two hour period, we moved the
lights around to different parts of the store for a total of 8 or 9 different setups. Because of the lighter weight and sturdier but light
stands (compared to Caselights) they were easier to move than fluorescents. However, the fact that the lights are DC and have
power supplies becomes just a little bit of a hassle. You have to be careful to not drop a power supply--it could crack. The supplies
are lightweight and solid, but anything like that is prone to breakage. I've had Lowel cords end up with cracked receptacles
(the end that plugs into the light) because they're hard plastic and on occasion somebody will drop one onto a concrete floor,
or step on one.

What I'm going to do is either wrap the power supplies in foam tape (something like the foam chroma key blue/green tape you
can buy at lighting gear equipment places) or see if I can get my wife to make some little drawstring pouches that are padded.
Other than the danger of cracking a power supply during moving, location shooting with these lights is a pleasure.

The 500LEDs are smaller than they look in pictures. We're accustomed to these types of lights being about 2 feet long because
they look a lot like the equivalent fluorescents that are so common. However, they are much smaller. Here is a 500LED set up
next to a Lowel Tota light, for size comparison.

The body of the 500LED is just under 14" long, and about 8" wide. It's about 3" thick, 3-1/2" if you count the thickness of the
folded barn doors.

Dang! It won't fit in the Blade Runner faux-metal briefcase. The power supply is only 4" long, less than an inch thick. The cable to the XLR that plugs into the back of the light is plenty long enough for the power supply to reach the ground even with the stand elevated. The AC cord is about 5' long. It takes awhile for those of us raised to think that anything smaller than No. 12 cable is dangerous to get accustomed to the small size of cords when only 40 watts of power is needed. Bill Pryor is a video and photography pro and the moderator of our camera forum at DVFreelancer.