New Coollights LED600 Arrived Today

Stewart Menelaws · February 4th, 2009, 03:21 PM

For those interested here is the link to the promised review of various makes of LED lighting products brought to our studio. The main part tends to focus more on the Cool Lights LED600 panels and you can see them in various environments from interior, exterior sets and from industrial to studio use.

http://www.studioscotland.com/litepan_review.htm

Regards: Stu
www.studioscotland.com

Nicholas de Kock · February 4th, 2009, 04:23 PM

I currently use a 500W worklight for my productions and weddings, will this product be a good replacement? Does it match a softbox? Will I be able to place it 4 meters from a subject and get enough light? I'm new to AB, V-Mount batteries, I'm not quite sure what this means or what I should buy, could anyone please explain this to me, maybe even advise what would be the cheapest/best for me to buy.

Stewart thanks for the review, much appreciated. I also noticed you use a ladder as a dolly, this is genius! I've been struggling to find a transport solution my aluminium build dolly, that ladder takes the cake!

Tim Polster · February 4th, 2009, 06:53 PM

Thank you for your review Stewart.

I am very happy to see the lights having an impact in outdoor scenes.

I realize they are not the sun, but they look as if they can add some fill when shooting people outside.

That really helps when the alternative is no light or bringing out the generator.

Eric Stemen · February 4th, 2009, 07:49 PM

Nicholas, an AB mount stands for Anton Bauer. Here is a link to the battery that I think would fit an AB mount.
Anton Bauer | Digital HyTRON 140, NiMH Battery | HYTRON140 | B&H
With this version of the battery I would assume it should power the LED fixture for roughly 2.9 hours.
This a a link to a V-mount style battery.
IDX | ELITE Endura Lithium-Ion V-Mount Battery - 14.4 | ELITE

It looks like both options are about the same cost and have the same number of Watt Hours.

I see that there is also a 4 pin XLR on this light. I'm wondering if someone has a 12v battery and puts a male 4 pin XLR connector on the battery, if that could then power the light. On the specs it says 4 pin XLR output so I assume trying this would mess up the light.

Oh yeah Richard, I can't believe you remember I took one of your fresnels into a crawl space. I completely forgot about that.

Sorry I can't be more help about answering your question about how these will compare to a worklight. Richard did post specs about how these compare to a 650W fresnel which should be much more directional than your worklight, and when the fresnel is flooded out some it appears that the LEDs are brighter.

Dan Chung · February 4th, 2009, 08:25 PM

Stewart, Great review, I am also very happy with the kit Richard sold me. I too really like the Litepanels and in time may get one or two, but these Coolights will form the bulk of my lighting rig. As for smaller lights I have a combination of LPMicro, Vidleds and IDX lights but am going to try the IKAN unit, do you have any experience with that one?

Richard, instead of using gels do you think you can perhaps make a more rigid colour correcting filter that could be left in place as a kind of protector as well? It would make life that little bit easier.

Dan

Richard Andrewski · February 4th, 2009, 08:54 PM

Stewart,

Thanks so much! We appreciate the time you spent on that. Your's must be one of the first reviews of the Kelvin Tile also.

Nicholas,

All good questions. I would say the LED600 should be a bit brighter than your 500w work light and is native daylight so doesn't need to be gelled to match daylight. Available in tungsten color too. Eric gave a good explanation of battery technology but you can also use just about anything that can be adapted out through a 4 pin XLR connector into our fixture and puts out between 10VDC and 24VDC. That really opens up a lot of possibilities for battery powering.

Eric,

Thanks for the info on batteries. The batteries I tested with so far were my RED Vmount 140wh, and I also have two batteries from the same company that makes batteries for the website batteries4broadcast.com--a 160wh ab mount and a 190wh v mount. All these work fine because those standards are so well implemented that you can pretty much just count on them working.

Dan,

Yes I have thought about the filters and am going to look into that for next production cycle. At least a 1/8 minus green and a full CTO would be great to have in a 1/16" thick acrylic panel. Maybe also a plastic fresnel lens and a prismatic diffusion panel also. What a great set to have to go along with the LED 600 and paired with a flat nylon carring case.

Stewart Menelaws · February 5th, 2009, 03:26 AM

You are all very welcome to the review, pictures speak a thousand words and I hope many will be able to see what can be achieved with these units. We will be shooting out in the Middle East shortly and the Cool Lights are going with us to all kinds of outdoor and indoor environments. We are still trying to work out our ultimate LED travel package that will be feasible to take onto an aircraft.

Richard: So far we have had no issues whatsoever with these units and in fact, today we are off to a photo shoot (product photography) and we were about to pack some strobes and soft boxes when I thought.. “Hey lets take the Cool Lights and give them a try”. Took us minutes to pack what we need and you could throw the amount of kit in the back seat of a small car compared to the back of a pick up truck. I just love it when people make my life easier… :-)

Tim: They really do work outside! have no fear...

Dan: – Not used IKAN lights… have you tried the 1X1s?, we have decided not to get them because the LED600s are doing the job very well and are brighter. The Lite Panels Mini Plus is fabulous and far more useable than the Micro - but expensive.

Nicholas: – In my experience, 20 years ago I used work lights to very good effect, however, when you can afford it, pro built lighting is far user friendly. The Cool Lights do indeed kick out more light than a 500w TH and the light quality is far easier to deal with in regards to colour temperature – it all depends what you’re doing. Heat is another issue you would not miss. Battery power as explained by …. is very useful. A reason we use V-Lock batteries is because they also fit our cameras and field monitors – it’s all part of a system…; however that kind of convenience does come at a price if you are just starting out.

As you can see from the pics – those LED600s are a good distance from the subject matter –and they needed to be because grit blasting was being done!

And oh yes... the ladder dolly is a great little invention...

Richard has delivered a super product at a fantastic price point.

Regards: Stu
www.studioscotland.com

Nicholas de Kock · February 5th, 2009, 03:48 AM

Thanks for all the replies to my questions. Richard you have done it once again, you should be awarded an innovation award for yet another superb "working" idea. I've been dreaming about 5600K light, however always out of my budgets reach (HMI, Litepanels). I'm looking forward to owning two units.

Richard do you think you could add a radio controlled switch into the mix for distance on/off control? I would try modding mine for this however it would be great if you designed them into the lights.

Richard Gooderick · February 5th, 2009, 05:28 AM

The option to run these lights from batteries is very attractive eg flexibility and fast set-up times. However I was horrified at what the batteries cost.
Richard - I use a Tamiya rechargeable battery for my Fostex FR2 LE sound recorder. It's the sort of battery they sell in model shops for toy cars etc. Would one of these work as well as the AB and V mount batteries (sorry, I know absolutely nothing about these batteries)?
If so do you know if it is possible to buy a caddy to drop the battery into so that you can plug the light into it. And if there isn't such a thing would it be an attractive idea for you to make one? I'm happy not to mount the battery on the light itself. At the foot of the lighting stand would work fine for me. Makes the light more stable too.
I've already got quite a bit of money tied up in batteries and chargers for my Sony and Canon cameras etc and don't want to spend more, particularly at these prices.

Richard Andrewski · February 5th, 2009, 08:28 AM

Hi Richard,

The power draw in your Fostex recorder is very low so the batteries used for it wouldn't work for long at all with the LED600. Our panel draws almost 50w at 12VDC so its much more power hungry and thus you need a more serious battery to power it. Thats why we went with the AB or V mount types which are typically 14.5 to 16 volts and can be found easily up to 190WH. To get the time such a battery would drive our panel, you simply divide the 190 / 50 and you get 3.8 hours. In actual practice, its a bit less but this is close enough for figuring out the rough capacity. My 160WH AB battery powers the unit for about 3 hours (160/50 = 3.2).

Your Fostex can work for 4 hours on 4 AA batteries so the two are worlds apart in power usage. You can power the panel off of a cigarette lighter or power tap in a car as long as its rated for at least 50w or so.

Cars have lead acid batteries in them which are very reliable but also very big and heavy. The lithium types like the v and ab are so much more compact and lightweight compared to lead acid technology and more complicated too so they draw a premium in price. Portability does usually equate to a more complex setup and more cost as well.

Richard Gooderick · February 5th, 2009, 09:04 AM

Thanks Richard
I sorry. I am completely hopeless when it comes to anything to do with electricity. It's a complete blind spot with me. My Tamiya battery has got 4300 written on it. I've no idea what that means but I get the message that it is too underpowered.
It sounds like the only way to run the light off a battery without paying more for the battery than the light is to use a car battery with an inverter? Until you bring out a DC option. I can't imagine myself doing it very often but it might be useful on the odd occasion.

Richard Andrewski · February 5th, 2009, 09:20 AM

Richard,

Not necessary to use an inverter with any battery or with our panel. The input of the LED600 is DC 10V to 24V so anything in that range will work which includes car batteries (12vdc). The panel comes with an AC to DC power supply so thats how you power it from the wall.

The main thing is to rig up a 4 pin XLR cable from the battery to our unit. For instance you would need a cigarette lighter connector on one side for use in a car and a 4 pin XLR female on the other side (pin 1 ground / pin 4 + voltage -- pin 2 and 3 open). If you're not sure how to do that, I'm sure its possible to find that cable or get someone to make one for you.

Richard Gooderick · February 5th, 2009, 11:02 AM

Hi Richard
Many thanks. That's very helpful.

Leo Versola · February 5th, 2009, 11:51 AM

Stewart, nice review; thanks. If I may ask, what was the price range of the Kelvin Tile?

Thanks again...

Eric Stemen · February 5th, 2009, 11:52 AM

Hey Richard (from the UK) here's a website that has lead acid sealed batteries.
AP-1250F1 - Amstron 12V/5AH Sealed Lead Acid Battery w/ F1 Terminal

The link I gave you is for a 60 watt hour (Whr) so it would be able to power one of the LED lights for probably an hour and a few minutes.

I don't know anything at all about this company and by no means recommend or not recommend this site. I just wanted to let you know that you can make your own battery pack on the cheap, and would only weigh about 4lbs. If you do want to go the route of making your own batteries make sure the lead acid battery is a sealed type. I assume most of the small ones will be like that.

Combine that or a similar battery with these three items and you should have an inexpensive portable power option.

Bescor | XLR-CP 4-pin XLR Female to Cigarette Male | XLRCP | B&H

Bescor | XLR-12MF 4-pin XLR Male to 4-pin Female Power | XLR10MF

Bass Pro Shops Battery Clip Cigarette Lighter Plug Adapter

total cost for materials to run the light for about an hour $70 plus however much shipping would be.

To make a setup that would last as long as the pro batteries I mentioned earlier would be about $100 since all you would have to do would buy two more of the above batteries.

The hidden cost of saving all this money would be that you pay for it in weight and inconvenience. The pro battery costs about 5 times as much as the home made version....however the pro battery weighs 5.5lbs and the home made version would weigh in at about 13 pounds and take up much more space. Another advantage to the home made version is that you could charge these batteries with pretty much any car charger set on low....then you could make a wire connecting all the batteries in parallel and charge them all at once. Basically if you get somewhere and you need light to last longer I believe you can find 12V batteries just about anywhere in the world.

Everything is a trade off.

February 4th, 2009, 03:21 PM	#16
Stewart Menelaws Major Player Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Scotland (UK) Posts: 219	LED Review For those interested here is the link to the promised review of various makes of LED lighting products brought to our studio. The main part tends to focus more on the Cool Lights LED600 panels and you can see them in various environments from interior, exterior sets and from industrial to studio use. http://www.studioscotland.com/litepan_review.htm Regards: Stu www.studioscotland.com

February 4th, 2009, 08:54 PM	#21
Richard Andrewski Major Player Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Shenzhen, China Posts: 781	Stewart, Thanks so much! We appreciate the time you spent on that. Your's must be one of the first reviews of the Kelvin Tile also. Nicholas, All good questions. I would say the LED600 should be a bit brighter than your 500w work light and is native daylight so doesn't need to be gelled to match daylight. Available in tungsten color too. Eric gave a good explanation of battery technology but you can also use just about anything that can be adapted out through a 4 pin XLR connector into our fixture and puts out between 10VDC and 24VDC. That really opens up a lot of possibilities for battery powering. Eric, Thanks for the info on batteries. The batteries I tested with so far were my RED Vmount 140wh, and I also have two batteries from the same company that makes batteries for the website batteries4broadcast.com--a 160wh ab mount and a 190wh v mount. All these work fine because those standards are so well implemented that you can pretty much just count on them working. Dan, Yes I have thought about the filters and am going to look into that for next production cycle. At least a 1/8 minus green and a full CTO would be great to have in a 1/16" thick acrylic panel. Maybe also a plastic fresnel lens and a prismatic diffusion panel also. What a great set to have to go along with the LED 600 and paired with a flat nylon carring case. __________________ Richard Andrewski - Cool Lights USA - RED #114 http://www.coollights.biz

February 5th, 2009, 05:28 AM	#24
Richard Gooderick Major Player Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: London, UK Posts: 795	The option to run these lights from batteries is very attractive eg flexibility and fast set-up times. However I was horrified at what the batteries cost. Richard - I use a Tamiya rechargeable battery for my Fostex FR2 LE sound recorder. It's the sort of battery they sell in model shops for toy cars etc. Would one of these work as well as the AB and V mount batteries (sorry, I know absolutely nothing about these batteries)? If so do you know if it is possible to buy a caddy to drop the battery into so that you can plug the light into it. And if there isn't such a thing would it be an attractive idea for you to make one? I'm happy not to mount the battery on the light itself. At the foot of the lighting stand would work fine for me. Makes the light more stable too. I've already got quite a bit of money tied up in batteries and chargers for my Sony and Canon cameras etc and don't want to spend more, particularly at these prices. __________________ http://www.gooderick.com

February 5th, 2009, 08:28 AM	#25
Richard Andrewski Major Player Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Shenzhen, China Posts: 781	Hi Richard, The power draw in your Fostex recorder is very low so the batteries used for it wouldn't work for long at all with the LED600. Our panel draws almost 50w at 12VDC so its much more power hungry and thus you need a more serious battery to power it. Thats why we went with the AB or V mount types which are typically 14.5 to 16 volts and can be found easily up to 190WH. To get the time such a battery would drive our panel, you simply divide the 190 / 50 and you get 3.8 hours. In actual practice, its a bit less but this is close enough for figuring out the rough capacity. My 160WH AB battery powers the unit for about 3 hours (160/50 = 3.2). Your Fostex can work for 4 hours on 4 AA batteries so the two are worlds apart in power usage. You can power the panel off of a cigarette lighter or power tap in a car as long as its rated for at least 50w or so. Cars have lead acid batteries in them which are very reliable but also very big and heavy. The lithium types like the v and ab are so much more compact and lightweight compared to lead acid technology and more complicated too so they draw a premium in price. Portability does usually equate to a more complex setup and more cost as well. __________________ Richard Andrewski - Cool Lights USA - RED #114 http://www.coollights.biz

February 5th, 2009, 09:04 AM	#26
Richard Gooderick Major Player Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: London, UK Posts: 795	Thanks Richard I sorry. I am completely hopeless when it comes to anything to do with electricity. It's a complete blind spot with me. My Tamiya battery has got 4300 written on it. I've no idea what that means but I get the message that it is too underpowered. It sounds like the only way to run the light off a battery without paying more for the battery than the light is to use a car battery with an inverter? Until you bring out a DC option. I can't imagine myself doing it very often but it might be useful on the odd occasion. __________________ http://www.gooderick.com

February 4th, 2009, 04:23 PM	#17
Nicholas de Kock Major Player Join Date: May 2007 Location: KLD, South Africa Posts: 983	I currently use a 500W worklight for my productions and weddings, will this product be a good replacement? Does it match a softbox? Will I be able to place it 4 meters from a subject and get enough light? I'm new to AB, V-Mount batteries, I'm not quite sure what this means or what I should buy, could anyone please explain this to me, maybe even advise what would be the cheapest/best for me to buy. Stewart thanks for the review, much appreciated. I also noticed you use a ladder as a dolly, this is genius! I've been struggling to find a transport solution my aluminium build dolly, that ladder takes the cake!

February 4th, 2009, 06:53 PM	#18
Tim Polster Inner Circle Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Arlington, TX Posts: 2,231	Thank you for your review Stewart. I am very happy to see the lights having an impact in outdoor scenes. I realize they are not the sun, but they look as if they can add some fill when shooting people outside. That really helps when the alternative is no light or bringing out the generator.

February 4th, 2009, 07:49 PM	#19
Eric Stemen Major Player Join Date: May 2004 Location: Louisville, KY Posts: 378	Nicholas, an AB mount stands for Anton Bauer. Here is a link to the battery that I think would fit an AB mount. Anton Bauer \| Digital HyTRON 140, NiMH Battery \| HYTRON140 \| B&H With this version of the battery I would assume it should power the LED fixture for roughly 2.9 hours. This a a link to a V-mount style battery. IDX \| ELITE Endura Lithium-Ion V-Mount Battery - 14.4 \| ELITE It looks like both options are about the same cost and have the same number of Watt Hours. I see that there is also a 4 pin XLR on this light. I'm wondering if someone has a 12v battery and puts a male 4 pin XLR connector on the battery, if that could then power the light. On the specs it says 4 pin XLR output so I assume trying this would mess up the light. Oh yeah Richard, I can't believe you remember I took one of your fresnels into a crawl space. I completely forgot about that. Sorry I can't be more help about answering your question about how these will compare to a worklight. Richard did post specs about how these compare to a 650W fresnel which should be much more directional than your worklight, and when the fresnel is flooded out some it appears that the LEDs are brighter.

February 4th, 2009, 08:25 PM	#20
Dan Chung Major Player Join Date: Apr 2008 Location: Beijing Posts: 665	Stewart, Great review, I am also very happy with the kit Richard sold me. I too really like the Litepanels and in time may get one or two, but these Coolights will form the bulk of my lighting rig. As for smaller lights I have a combination of LPMicro, Vidleds and IDX lights but am going to try the IKAN unit, do you have any experience with that one? Richard, instead of using gels do you think you can perhaps make a more rigid colour correcting filter that could be left in place as a kind of protector as well? It would make life that little bit easier. Dan

February 5th, 2009, 03:26 AM	#22
Stewart Menelaws Major Player Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Scotland (UK) Posts: 219	You are all very welcome to the review, pictures speak a thousand words and I hope many will be able to see what can be achieved with these units. We will be shooting out in the Middle East shortly and the Cool Lights are going with us to all kinds of outdoor and indoor environments. We are still trying to work out our ultimate LED travel package that will be feasible to take onto an aircraft. Richard: So far we have had no issues whatsoever with these units and in fact, today we are off to a photo shoot (product photography) and we were about to pack some strobes and soft boxes when I thought.. “Hey lets take the Cool Lights and give them a try”. Took us minutes to pack what we need and you could throw the amount of kit in the back seat of a small car compared to the back of a pick up truck. I just love it when people make my life easier… :-) Tim: They really do work outside! have no fear... Dan: – Not used IKAN lights… have you tried the 1X1s?, we have decided not to get them because the LED600s are doing the job very well and are brighter. The Lite Panels Mini Plus is fabulous and far more useable than the Micro - but expensive. Nicholas: – In my experience, 20 years ago I used work lights to very good effect, however, when you can afford it, pro built lighting is far user friendly. The Cool Lights do indeed kick out more light than a 500w TH and the light quality is far easier to deal with in regards to colour temperature – it all depends what you’re doing. Heat is another issue you would not miss. Battery power as explained by …. is very useful. A reason we use V-Lock batteries is because they also fit our cameras and field monitors – it’s all part of a system…; however that kind of convenience does come at a price if you are just starting out. As you can see from the pics – those LED600s are a good distance from the subject matter –and they needed to be because grit blasting was being done! And oh yes... the ladder dolly is a great little invention... Richard has delivered a super product at a fantastic price point. Regards: Stu www.studioscotland.com

February 5th, 2009, 03:48 AM	#23
Nicholas de Kock Major Player Join Date: May 2007 Location: KLD, South Africa Posts: 983	Thanks for all the replies to my questions. Richard you have done it once again, you should be awarded an innovation award for yet another superb "working" idea. I've been dreaming about 5600K light, however always out of my budgets reach (HMI, Litepanels). I'm looking forward to owning two units. Richard do you think you could add a radio controlled switch into the mix for distance on/off control? I would try modding mine for this however it would be great if you designed them into the lights.

February 5th, 2009, 09:20 AM	#27
Richard Andrewski Major Player Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Shenzhen, China Posts: 781	Richard, Not necessary to use an inverter with any battery or with our panel. The input of the LED600 is DC 10V to 24V so anything in that range will work which includes car batteries (12vdc). The panel comes with an AC to DC power supply so thats how you power it from the wall. The main thing is to rig up a 4 pin XLR cable from the battery to our unit. For instance you would need a cigarette lighter connector on one side for use in a car and a 4 pin XLR female on the other side (pin 1 ground / pin 4 + voltage -- pin 2 and 3 open). If you're not sure how to do that, I'm sure its possible to find that cable or get someone to make one for you. __________________ Richard Andrewski - Cool Lights USA - RED #114 http://www.coollights.biz

February 5th, 2009, 11:02 AM	#28
Richard Gooderick Major Player Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: London, UK Posts: 795	Hi Richard Many thanks. That's very helpful. __________________ http://www.gooderick.com

February 5th, 2009, 11:51 AM	#29
Leo Versola Regular Crew Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: San Francisco, CA Posts: 73	Stewart, nice review; thanks. If I may ask, what was the price range of the Kelvin Tile? Thanks again...

February 5th, 2009, 11:52 AM	#30
Eric Stemen Major Player Join Date: May 2004 Location: Louisville, KY Posts: 378	Hey Richard (from the UK) here's a website that has lead acid sealed batteries. AP-1250F1 - Amstron 12V/5AH Sealed Lead Acid Battery w/ F1 Terminal The link I gave you is for a 60 watt hour (Whr) so it would be able to power one of the LED lights for probably an hour and a few minutes. I don't know anything at all about this company and by no means recommend or not recommend this site. I just wanted to let you know that you can make your own battery pack on the cheap, and would only weigh about 4lbs. If you do want to go the route of making your own batteries make sure the lead acid battery is a sealed type. I assume most of the small ones will be like that. Combine that or a similar battery with these three items and you should have an inexpensive portable power option. Bescor \| XLR-CP 4-pin XLR Female to Cigarette Male \| XLRCP \| B&H Bescor \| XLR-12MF 4-pin XLR Male to 4-pin Female Power \| XLR10MF Bass Pro Shops Battery Clip Cigarette Lighter Plug Adapter total cost for materials to run the light for about an hour $70 plus however much shipping would be. To make a setup that would last as long as the pro batteries I mentioned earlier would be about $100 since all you would have to do would buy two more of the above batteries. The hidden cost of saving all this money would be that you pay for it in weight and inconvenience. The pro battery costs about 5 times as much as the home made version....however the pro battery weighs 5.5lbs and the home made version would weigh in at about 13 pounds and take up much more space. Another advantage to the home made version is that you could charge these batteries with pretty much any car charger set on low....then you could make a wire connecting all the batteries in parallel and charge them all at once. Basically if you get somewhere and you need light to last longer I believe you can find 12V batteries just about anywhere in the world. Everything is a trade off. Last edited by Eric Stemen; February 5th, 2009 at 12:04 PM. Reason: add more information.

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