Dedolight Ledzilla and Litepanels SOLA ENG

O

Orben

New member
I am hoping to get feedback on the utility of these two similar units for the purposes of an on-board light for (occasional) use on a Sony EX1r and as an often used hairlight / background light and shaper for interview settings.

I have not found much real world feedback but would like to get some opinions - even if only based on specs or hearsay.

data and video showing the use of Ledzilla;
http://www.dedolight.com/www/assets/pdf/DLOBML_New Kits_NAB09.pdf
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_e3hd5tn8ms

data on Litepanels Sola ENG;
http://www.litepanels.com/sola_eng.html

It would appear that the Sola ENG has a bit more Lumens to offer and perhaps the Ledzilla has some flexibility and built in filter advantages - but that may just be my impression.
 
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I read somewhere that the sola had some fan noise...and Start full blast when open...that's the down side....Litepanel is working on an update but i don't know more about it...but i think, imho, the Sola is the best on camera light on the market now.
 
Well...just bought a 2nd hand LEDzilla. Too small for a fan (ha!)..hope it's useful. Should serve me well as a lightweight backlight and battery op run n gunner when needed. Still want to know what those logocam LEDs go for.
 
Yikes:
Re: Litepanels Sola ENG On-Camera LED Light
by Tim Brown 2 hours ago10300Beware! I bought a Sola and the dimmer ring fell off the first time I used it. Took it back and swapped for a new one. Same thing. Did it again.....yep, same thing. The dealer was getting annoyed at me so I talked to another dealer (Melbourne, Australia) and she said ALL of her Sola lights had broken. One customer was happy to keep his and glue it up. I almost feel the same way because I love the light, but I think I'll wait until v2.0. The ring is attached by two small metal screws that bed into tiny PLASTIC lugs. Someone is asleep at the wheel at Litepanels.
 
Any mention of CRI in any of those models or other on camera led lights? seems like the CRI figure is almost always omitted from specs. Wonder why..Hmmm. Also, whay can't manufacturers have a standard distance (3 ft or a meter) lux, lumen output.? I see some lumen measurements at 2 feet and spotty settings which drive up the lumen specs over the roof. A standard of measurement is really needed here.
 
I recently bought the LedZilla to go with my AF100, but I'm waiting for my battery attachment to arrive in the mail--- so I haven't been able to test it.

Does anyone know how many lumens this light has? Obviously the Sola will blow it away but don't feel like having to convert my AF100 to Anton Bauer to use a d-tap.

I imagine the Litepanel Miniplus will put out more light, but I don't like the light that much from it and it fades fast.
 
I have been trying to obtain the lumen figure of that light but I cammot find it . Anyway. I see from the specs that it consumes 8 watts. Let us assume that ALL 8 watts go to the led (s) and that there is no driver efficiency loss/electronics/wiring etc. Now I figure that the most efficient leds are in the range of 130 to 160 lumens per watt and also assuming that heat will not have any effect on
lowering the lumen value at full output. Now I see that 160 lumen per watt X 8 watts = 1280 lumens. That is like a 60 watt halogen. Now if you zoom in to a narrow angle beam, that figure should rise dramatically. In reality with driver loss ( unless it is a driverless light) and heat efficiency factor/ as well as the non linearity aspect of current to lumen graph, I assume that that light is around 900 lumen at best at 3 ft distance at the wide setting. Please correct me if I am wrong.
 
I suppose color temp is an additional issue..converting tungsten to daylight will significantly drop output. LEDzilla is daylight to start with.

Maybe the lensing is another issue. Seems to be siginificant even over the evolution of Dedo. These bits aren't on the LEDzilla, but may err..shed light on the issue:

"The self contained DLHM4-300, now with an integrated 150W dimmable power supply, combined with Aspheric 2 optics, allows for
drastically improved light output – up to three times more than its predecessor."



http://www.dedolight.com/www/assets/pdf/Series_400_Photometrics.pdf
"When comparing photometric data of different manufacturers, it should be noted that practically all other lights have a bell shaped light distribution curve (hot spots in the center), while Dedolight lighting fixtures show an equal intensity over the entire lit area.
Photometric data usually defines intensity at the center of the beam. Other comparable light sources of higher wattages may appear to have a higher output in
flood position, yet the Dedolights edge to edge output will actually be more. In spot position, the Dedolight will easily exceed the center intensity of other lights that have drastically higher wattage ratings."
 
The DLHM4-300 is a halogen light source and not a LED, also it started with a comparison of the Ledzilla (LED) and the SOLA (LED). Now we are confusing them with the Halogen unit. Both the SOLA and LEDZILLA are camera top units and I would like to see anyone use the DLHM4-300 on top of a camera. LEDS in general are roughly 6 times more efficient than halogens at best. When one posts a led light that has the equivalent light output of a 250Watt halogen yet consumes only 25 watts, something is fishy.
 
I was trying to suggest the evolving Dedo lens technology (as used in both tungsten and LEDzilla) might contribute to higher efficiency. That and the fact that the desired daylight color temp might make a daylight native LED more advantageous..i.e. no light robbing blue gel required.
I will also mention that Dedo has seemingly sourced their own LED emitter...might outperform typical LEDs??
The Dedo literature mentioned also suggests that the way light efficiency/output is measured might be misleading..traditional lights being measured at their brightest spot (center) as opposed to Dedos spreading the light more evenly across the beam.
 
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I really would like to see the Ledzilla placed exactly 3 feet away from a white non reflective mat surface and having it set at full brightness and at it's widest setting of beam spread, WITHOUT any Color Correcting filters or gels.The lightmeter can be set at say 100 or 400 asa and if it has both incident and reflective readings so much the better. Put the shutter speed on the meter at 1/30 th of a second and read off the aperture it shows. In incident mode place the meter against the white surface and the meter sensor facing directly at the light and take a reading.In reflected mode, place the meter next to the light and aim the meter sensor to the white surface for a reading. This is to establish an EV (exposure value) that can be converted easily to FC (foot candles).
 
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