LitePanels 4x4

[Alfeo Dixon]

Has anyone used the LitePanels 4x4 out there? How did it perform for you and what comparison could you make to the instruments that would have been used (i.e. 12K HMI punching thru a 4x silk or 6K Par straight on)?

[Pat Grosswendt @ LitePanels]

Has anyone used the LitePanels 4x4 out there? How did it perform for you and what comparison could you make to the instruments that would have been used (i.e. 12K HMI punching thru a 4x silk or 6K Par straight on)?

Please take a look at a set-up with a Litepanels 4x4 running on batteries in one of 2 of NY's most difficult locations to shot and the finished shot. Only one light: the Litepanels 4x4 was used for this campaign. The DP was Adam Beckman. A very talented man.

Litepanels provided by Shadowstone in New Jersey and serving a large part of the East Coast.

[Alfeo Dixon]

Please take a look at a set-up with a Litepanels 4x4 running on batteries in one of 2 of NY's most difficult locations to shot and the finished shot. Only one light: the Litepanels 4x4 was used for this campaign. The DP was Adam Beckman. A very talented man.

Litepanels provided by Shadowstone in New Jersey and serving a large part of the East Coast.

Pat, Thanks... that's pretty impressive, I have read many of instances where the 4x4 was a life saver as in time and efficiency in hard to shoot locations such as Grand Central Station. Any change on getting one out to Atlanta for a demo/workshop?

[timHealy]

Has anyone used the LitePanels 4x4 out there? How did it perform for you and what comparison could you make to the instruments that would have been used (i.e. 12K HMI punching thru a 4x silk or 6K Par straight on)?

 

All due respect towards Mr Beckman and the guys at Shadowstone, I very much doubt a 4x4 light panel will put out as much light as a 12 or 6 k par. A 4x4 lite panel may work fine for an interior or exterior night, like in the example Pat has provided, but if your looking to balance daylight I would stick with your bigger guns. But the question to always ask is how big is the shot? Maybe a large lite panel will work for a close up during the day. But most DP's will want power and light to be involved.

 

i'm just saying

 

best

 

Tim

[Noah Yuan-Vogel]

All due respect towards Mr Beckman and the guys at Shadowstone, I very much doubt a 4x4 light panel will put out as much light as a 12 or 6 k par.

 

Agreed, my understanding is that LEDs (especially ones designed for high-cri and specific color temp) are not likely to have much higher luminous efficiency than HMI and that manufacturer's claims about 40W fixtures being 500W equivalents are more related to LEDs having a higher efficiency non-adjustable lens and reflector on each lamp and on their standard 'flood' / 'spot' beams being narrower than the that of most fixtures to which they are compared. Plus they are likely comparing to tungsten softbox units which of course would be larger sources and have a very different quality of light from a 1x1 LED fixture. Comparing diffused light to very focused (LED) light would be quite difficult.

 

For example, the photometrics published by litepanels on their 1x1 standard spot are pretty similar to that of lowel's tungsten rifa 500w softbox, but the softbox is a diffused single source with 4x the area and essentially 180degree beam angle versus a smaller LED multi-source fixture with a 30degree beam angle.

 

A better comparison to LED might be a fresnel source, in which case the 40w 1x1 lightpanel photometrics are closer to a 150w Arri tungsten fresnel. So perhaps a 4x4 could be compared to 2k tungsten fresnel, where you'd need a bit of diffusion for the LEDs to match the evenness of the 2k and the 2k would need a bit of diffusion to match the size of the LEDs.

 

I'd be interested to see how the 4x4 compares to a 575W HMI Par with varying degrees of 4x4 diffusion on each.

 

Having not used a Litepanels 4x4 myself, I'd be interested to hear what someone who has thinks.