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Hiya! Some time ago I decided to complete a rather simple, but most importantly, affordable lighting setup that would be easy to carry around and to set up. LED panels ticked all these boxes, so I started to hunt for them on a sales and local Craigslist / eBay. This is what I managed to acquire: I decided to gather them all up and put together a short test comparing their light output, since it was the parameter that I cared about most. PART 1 - HOW MUCH LIGHT DO THEY ACTUALLY GIVE? I put all the lights on a lighting stand, my camera on a tripod and took photos of a cabinet that was exactly 3.5 meters (~11.5 feet) away from them. Just what you could call 'a flood mode'. No light modifiers in front, no objects in front. I measured both the lowest and the highest brightness settings and also took notice of white balance. No other lights were turned on, my room was pitch black. The first light I turned on was Neewer Foldable 256 that consists of 256 LED beads. Dozens of positive reviews on amazon praising its mobility and high output. I only got it yesterday, but truth be told, I'm not really convinced by it. Doesn't feel much sturdy and I'm quite confident that if you used it on a daily basis, it wouldn't last more than a year, especially the velcro stripes. What's more, it can only be controlled by a remote included in the package - there are no dials / knobs on the light itself, which is a pity. This one is powered via AC adapter and can't run on any batteries. It's rated at 40 W, which in my case translated to an exposure of: - at the lowest setting (10%) → f/1.4 , 1/80 s, ISO 800 which, according to a smart exposure calculators, equals EV100 = 4.3; white balance - 5550K, - at the highest setting (100%) → f/1.4 , 1/100 s, ISO 160 → EV100 = 6.9; white balance - 5600K. The second light - a cheap cabinet LED bar that I consider as a poor-man's Quasar / Astera Tube. Bought it for 4$ and features 36 LED beads. I plan to combine 3 of them together in some nicer 3D printed housing and use it as a practical light / hair light that could be put anywhere in the frame. Runs on a USB 5V - every power bank is capable of powering it. Doesn't feature any brightness control, it's either at 0 or 100%. With it I managed to get a following exposure: f/1.4 , 1/80 s, ISO 2500 → EV100 = 2.6; WB - 6000K and astonishing +60 tint (don't even ask about CRI). The third competitor - Neewer CN 176. Just like the name says - it has 176 LEDs, rated at 11W. Got it for 15$ and that included a NP-F550 battery. It's quite nice and very handy. Can be powered with a battery or an AC plug. Results: - at the lowest setting (10%) → f/1.4 , 1/80 s, ISO 3200 → EV100 = 2.3; WB - 5800K, - at the highest setting (100%) → f/1.4 , 1/80 s, ISO 250 → EV100 ~ 6.0; WB - 5700K. The fourth light - Yongnuo YN-300 III 5500K The first light I ever bought. Most feature-packed, since it can be controlled with my phone via some app. The original package included an orange card, a diffusion card, a remote and a bunch of adapters, etc. Can be powered with a battery or an AC plug. 300 daylight balanced LEDs, 18W Results: - at the lowest setting (10%) → f/1.4 , 1/80 s, ISO 1000 → EV100 ~ 4.0; WB - 5950K - at the highest setting (100%) → f/1.4 , 1/125 s, ISO 160 → EV100 ~ 7.33; WB - 5650K. Quite funny - it overpowered the foldable Neewer. And the last, but definitely not least - Neewer 660 Bi-color 660 LEDs; 330 are supposed to be 5600K and 330 - 3200 K; rated at 40W The most robust build - all metal. Feels very solid and looks expensive. Bought for 60$. Can be powered with a single battery (even though it features a dual NP-F slot) or an AC plug. Results: - at the lowest setting, daylight LEDs only → f/1.4 , 1/80 s, ISO 1600 → EV100 - 3.6; WB - 5900K - at the highest setting, daylight LEDs only → f/1.4 , 1/120 s, ISO 160 → EV100 ~ 7.3; WB - 5900K - funny thing, the photo looks EXACTLY the same as the previous one, no WB shift, no color shift, at all. - at the lowest setting, tungsten LEDs only → f/1.4 , 1/80 s, ISO 1250 → EV100 - 3.6; WB - 3600K - at the highest setting, daylight LEDs only → f/1.4 , 1/105 s, ISO 160 → EV100 - 6.9; WB - 3600K - slight tint shift - at the highest setting, both LED types → f/1.4 , 1/220 s, ISO 160 → EV100 ~ 8.15; WB - 4600K To get you an idea, how does an exposure of f/1.4 , 1/220 s, ISO 160 looks like, here is a photo taken at 8:10AM (the sun rises at 5:50 AM) with those exact parameters: A bigger picture of this scene, taken with my phone (HDR enabled): To sum up: Neewer 660 is the brightest of the bunch followed by Yongnuo YN-300, which almost matches its bigger competitor at daylight temperature (that's quite a surprise). I'm a bit dissapointed with the foldable Neewer - it didn't really amaze me and I find it LESS practical than any other light. Fortunately, I bought it on Amazon and I think I'll be returning it in the next few days. Neewer CN 176 did quite good; might serve as a nice hair light / fill light. The LED bar didn't win any awards, but it's a different kind of a beast - I promise you, I'll make it shine some day, lol. Hopefully more parts of this comparison will come. I'll put them against some diffusion and test their color renderition. Ideally, I'd like to get a Godox SL-60 or a Weeylite Ninja 400 150W (what a whacky name) to have some more power at disposal. Maybe in the future.. Hope you got something out of this post.

I don't see anything possibly bad about Fuji doing a cinema camera. Big battery, good codecs, internal RAW, 1000 knit big screen, internal ND's(don't even need to be electronic), good AF(maybe more video focused). Why not blow the market away with something great. It wouldn't have to take away from their XT3 sales. Price it around $4000 or so. I don't think most people buying an XT3 would buy $4000 cinema camera over that. It would just be like a new market they can get.

Here is my shot at this Gears: GH5 for the video Canon 6D for the timelapse Mavic Air and Mavic 2 Zoom for the aerial shots. The audio was entirely designed by my friends at https://www.boxoftoysaudio.com/ They are based in UK if you need audio music composition and SFX. Great pros. I hope everyone here is safe and stay that way. Cheers.

Nice post, I just don't understand why this is not posted on footage subforum or better yet, why you ALL underrate that precious corner Andrew has opened for his priceless forum? : -)

These lights are great. I still use them quite a bit even though I have my Godox SL-60W. I'd definitely recommend it for those starting out or who need some affordable, good LED lights! It was really the first budget LED I worked with that I felt was worth it. The ones I'd worked with before gave a nasty green tint.

Really sorry to hear about that @Sage Thanks for all the work you do on this, it's much appreciated, although events lately and your personal news put all this camera stuff into perspective. Take care mate.

Ha the world looks so much better without people in it , nice work!

Be careful with attaching lenses. Every one I have seen reviews of is a disaster optically, corners smeared, CA in spades, etc. Even the most expensive ones. The expensive ones are at bad-vintage lens quality, and the cheap ones are at "I made this lens with magnifying glasses and tape" quality. Think of them as instant very-vintage, which is fine if you lust after IQ that rivals a Petzval, but night-and-day to any real lenses.

If you have a Mac and are going to do quick turn around stuff then FCPX is great. For me that's it's strong point. I used Premiere years ago but I always found it slow compared to FC on my Macs. I'm starting to try a few edits with Resolve and I can see it will be great for more complicated projects (docs etc). But I'm sticking with FCPX for all my quick corporate stuff.

It was on the older, larger floppys. I think I was in 4th grade or something. I remember when a member of our party died in game you could write a small message on their tombstone. You could imagine what our pre-teen brains came up with... When you came across a tombstone anywhere in the game you could read what was written on the tombstone. Good times.

The good news is that these DIY methods are easy, I'm set now and don't need to try the Pro adapters. If the adapters were too long instead of short, then we'd really be screwed! Here's my final results with my 35mm SLR zoom lenses & adapters I use for video (your results may differ)... Nikkor AF 28-85mm f/3.5-4.5 on Fotodiox NIK-FX - parfocal, no adjustment needed. Nikkor AF 28-85mm f/3.5-4.5 on Fotodiox NIK(G)-FX - needs extension for parfocality. Canon FD 35-70 f4, and Canon FD 70-210 f4 on Fotasy FD-FX - parfocal, no adjustment needed. SMC Pentax-AF 100-300 f/4.5-5.6 on Fotodiox PK(A)-FX - needs extension for parfocality.

Yeah but they say the Xh2 is supposed to be video focused. Why not go all the way, since they are already deviating from their photography focus roots.

The V4 email should be out to everyone; if you haven't received it please let me know. A month ago, my father was diagnosed with advanced colon cancer at the same time that the virus situation was taking off, and life was thrown into disarray. March is colon cancer awareness month, and we are aware now (get screened every 10 years, starting at 50) The GH5S is, at last, supported. V4: Emotive Color Component ('EC709') - Remade in 'HDR', preserving intense values (exceeding 0.0-1.0), that are incorporated into final Rec709 envelope - Using the new engine, Arri Rec709 primaries are recreated at lower saturation, while 'projecting' this primary behavior to HDR gamut extents (beyond Arri Rec709 gamut clipping) - Raised highlight ceiling for Main (average between Soft and Linear) - Significantly refined saturation envelope for Main and Linear (& Soft, to a lesser extent) Core LogC - Remade with new engine (Incorporates initial baseline HSL conform) - Fixed chart scan error that added 1/18th incorrect neighboring sample value to each sample average (hidden mistake in my very earliest code) (Corrects for persistent slight inaccuracies despite multipass, such as magenta bias of shadow skin tone in Tungsten) - Fully linearized highlight rolloff (true to LogC) with maximal detail retention (effective highlight DR increase) - New smoothing algorithm (incorporated into engine) - 12 passes, combining two hue-aware algorithms for new smoothness standard while preserving hue lines - Most extreme gamut is now directly measured and preserved (i.e. colored Leds in night environments) Misc. - Added Exposure Compensation [PRE]s - actual exposure color conversions for use ahead of the conversion (interpolated from sample data, incorporating rolloff) - Added Auto Black Level POSTs - for use following the conversion; quickly conform black level in any NLE (No accompanying relative hue/saturation distortion whatsoever, unlike standard luma tools) - Remade all PREs with new engine, taking new NLE measurements to accommodate NLE profile rendition shifts since original release - Direct monitoring variations included for HLG and Cine-D, and VLog external monitoring variation (includes levels fix) - Rewrite of Pdf (for Gen.4) - Direct FCPX support added (with distinct PREs and Pdf) - Significantly more efficient file sizes - 16 bit Gradient Chart included to test smoothness of theoretical & far gamut, and reveal pipeline banding issues - Each file is now unique to its owner at coordinate level

I used Premiere Pro for 5 years, recently had the chance to try Final Cut Pro X this year at school. Even though I hate Apple I gave it a fair chance. Safe to say i'll be sticking with Resolve Studio.

If their technology is more or less topping out within the XT line I can't see them putting a more expensive/larger camera just above it. A similar rationale that they won't release a full frame camera? They have the GFX if you really want to spend some cash... obviously would be cool if they could create many new cameras to make everyone happy, but they have to be smart about it to survive surely.

So does mine, unfortunately.. I can't really say that it has evolved - I hadn't used it at its beginnings - but it's very reliable now. My workflow is: I dump all the footage into my PC, open Resolve, import all the media and click 'Generate Optimized Media'. After a while (in my case it usually lasts twice the length of the footage) it's ready to use - I can smoothly operate on 4K 400mbps H265 files. This video is quite useful and thoroughly explains all the features that can speed up your video editing:

DaVinci Resolve is superb, there's nothing I miss from Premiere. It's stable, power-efficient and ticks all the boxes - you can do everything in it, including editing, color grading, sound designing and VFX.

Nice work! For a limit of an hour you did a really good job. Lots of variety of shots to keep the edit moving, etc. I also kind of like the design of it, considering that the song is basically about the guitar, and so is the video, so it kind of suits.

I really liked the opening landscape shot - it felt like an excerpt from some fairy-tale. It took me a while to get used to the fact, that the guitar shown in the shots isn't the leading guitar in the song (at first). Overall, it's a good looking video - a terrific job, considering you had only an hour to capture so much footage. But if you don't mind me giving some words of critique: it felt a little inconsistent (which is mainly due to location and subject constraints). Nevertheless, it's pleasing to look at it and accompanies the track well. ( :

I see a PRS Guitar, I click on "like". But seriously, there are some really nice shots in this video. But it kinda doesn´t know what it wants to be. A music video connected to the song and the artist, or a behind the scenes/studio clip with him sitting in front of the iMac. Still, for a one hour shot with that small sony, it´s a nice result. Was the black and white look previously planned done on purpose or was maybe the grading with mixed lighing too stressfull?

The X-H1 was nigh on perfect, Fuji should just put the X-T3 sensor & 10bit in it and get it out the door. I don't see the need for any complete re-imagining to be honest, although some sort of electronically variable ND glass over the sensor would be nice.

I pulled the trigger on the BM5 and decided i'll do a little review on it. PROS Very bright with a solid build quality. Colors are accurate and I love being able to load and store luts in the monitor. SDI + HDMI are also a bonus. Monitor comes with a few cables like a dtap and camera control. You will need to supply your own mounting hardware and batteries. The False color is solid, no crazy latency issues either. The monitor is VERY sharp, so sharp you might need to dial it down. Depending on what your shooting you might not even need peaking as the perceived detail is enough to pull focus from. I really enjoy the fact that you can do monochrome viewing + color peaking. Makes manual focus very easy. Use NPF/Sony L batteries = cheap and very abundant. CONS There are some things that irk me about the monitor. For instance you have toggle through every view mode when using the waveform. (I only want to use the view mode when it takes up a smaller portion in the corner of the screen.) With the focus peaking it will put the color edges around your camera screen icons which is annoying. I don't remember either of my SmallHDs doing that. The Zebra setting has numerical values that make no sense, its not the typical 0 - 109 IRE. The fan when set to high is pretty loud but that's to be expected with a 5 inch monitor that's 2200 nits! I leave mine set to medium speed usually. The UI as a whole sucks compared to SmallHD's, its slower and not as intuitive. This is by far the biggest pitfall of the monitor and what keeps it from be a 5 star product. I use it with my FS5 and A7iii. Its a fantastic monitor for outdoor viewing with the 2200 Nits. I shoot sports outdoors and a lot times under the mid day sun and I haven't had any viewing issues with it. With the FS5 I use batteries with a dtap port so I don't have to use extra NPF batteries on the back of the unit. CONCLUSION Overall a very good value for $500, a good alternative if you want something more rugged than an Atomos Shinobi/Smallhd FOCUS but think the SmallHD 502B/503 ultrabright are to expensive.