Run&Gun
Veteran
Well, after many months and some small delays, one of mine finally arrived. I bought two, but for some reason, I was only shipped one. The gentleman I spoke with at Hive seemed confused, as well, since my paperwork showed that I paid for two units and shipping on both. It doesn't appear to be a stock issue, it just looks like some sort of mistake or oversight. I'm not worried and sure they will have it sorted out quickly.
This isn't an in-depth technical review with charts, pictures and numbers, etc. Just my initial impressions and thoughts after playing with it for a little while.
I did not order any additional accessories with mine, so it was just the basic light kit which consisted of the actual light itself, the yolk, reflector, barn doors, 3x holographic lenses in a storage pouch/bag, the power supply and an extension cable(header cable) from the power supply to the 100-C and the instruction booklet. I also received the goodies that came with being a kickstarter backer(T-shirt, sunglasses, etc.).
The light itself seems to be well made and heavy duty, which you can tell once you pick it up and feel it in your hands. I was a little concerned with the reflector, because it looked kind of "dainty" in pictures, but the frame is solid, just like the light body. The reflector twists ON and OFF very easily with with about a 1/4 turn. On the top ear that swivels to allow mounting of the barn doors and lenses, it has a spring loaded pin so that the ear can be "locked" in place. For this to work, though, you have to turn the ear 180 degrees opposite of what feels natural(I think it's a design flaw/oversight). The holographic lenses don't have a big ring to grab them by, like a lot of other lenses for light fixtures, but the 100-C isn't putting out nearly the amount of heat a tungsten or HMI fixture is, either. I sorta fixed the problem with a set of zipper-pulls, btw. The yolk is a pretty neat design. Not only does it tilt like you would expect, but you can loosen the main body of it and slide the light forward or backwards to help counterbalance any large or heavy front mounted accessories and you can rotate it/spin it, too. The body is also indexed to make it easy to return it to a certain specific fore or aft position. You can also easily and completely remove the 100-C from the yolk. This opens up a lot of flexibility for mounting it in weird or tight places and for ease in packing, too. The back of the light has all of the local controls and ports mounted there: 4-pin XLR power IN, DMX IN, DMX OUT, POWER Switch, DMX/Local control switch, Display Screen, two control knobs, Power Indicator light, DMX indicator light and a Mini-USB port for updates. The power supply looks like an off-the-shelf piece with a several foot long 4-pin XLR cable permanently attached on one end and a removable two-prong A/C cable on the other. The power supply is heavy and actually longer than the light itself, if the reflector was removed. This is one thing I definitely dis-like about a lot of(most) LED fixtures: the external power supply.
Local control of the light is fairly straight forward. Plug it in and turn the power switch on. A few moments after switching the light on, it comes to life in the last state that it was in when it was previously on(power level, CCT, etc.). On the screen, there are four settings indicated: top left "S" for saturation; top right "H" for hue; bottom left "D" for dimming; bottom right "K" for white light color temp(It is "C" when in DMX mode).
From the body, there are only two controls to make adjustments with: two knobs, one to the left and one to the right of the screen. The left knob toggles between the different adjustments and the right makes the adjustments(left is - and right +). Turning the right knob makes coarse adjustments and pushing it in while turning makes fine adjustments.
They also have a pretty good iPhone app for complete control over the light, as well. Unlike some of the other lights out there that use Bluetooth, the 100-C has it's Bluetooth on always when the light is powered, this makes it much more useable. Once you have used the app for the first time with an individual light and have saved it to memory, all you have to do each subsequent time is turn bluetooth ON on your phone(if it's not on already) and open the app and select the light(it will automatically show available lights and their status(power consumption, color, dimming level, etc.). No pairing each time like with the Astra modules. It has two control screens. The first could be considered the "fine control" screen. It has the name of the individual light(user adjustable) and a group name(if you have multiple lights in a set-up) and sliders and "+" "-" buttons and numerical readings for each adjustment(Saturation, Hue, Dimming, CCT). There are also five "buttons" at the bottom that can store the setting of the light completely(CCT, Dimming, Hue, Sat) so that you can instantly recall settings(i.e: 3200 @ 40% dimming, 5600 @ 100% dimming level, etc.). The buttons change colors to correspond to their settings(i.e: lower color temps are more orange, higher more white and "party colors" are that color). It has five settings that are stored in the light and five in the app, so you could have ten presets accessible from the app. There is also a button labeled "commissioning" that takes you to the second page that is a "color mixing" page that lets you just drag your finger across the boxes to adjust Dimming, CCT and the Hue/Sat box for making any color you want. And it adjusts in real time on the light. At the top of the page is a rectangle that shows/represents the exact color you have chosen and it gives you it's numerical dimming, saturation, hue and CCT value.
So, so far we can see that Hive has given us a fairly well-built unit with easy to use controls and a pretty darn good control app. But what about what's really important, the quality of the light itself...
Again, this isn't a super-scientific test with charts and meters and world-renowned DP's and gaffers, just me. To see how well the light was going to be on-camera, I went with one of my workhorse P2 VariCams and a smallHD DP7Pro OLED monitor. To evaluate the "white light" of the 100-C, I set the camera to preset(3200, 4300, 5600) and the light to the corresponding color temp and evaluated how it looked to my eye on the monitor. Then I would do a white balance on the camera and look at the image again.
First, the bad news. I'm sure a lot of people saw the LED light shootout that Timur Civan did on No Film School and the disappointing 3200 results that the 100-C put up. Well, the light does have a green push at 3200. With my VariCam at 3200 preset and the 100-C dialed into 3200(SAT:000, HUE: 000), there was definitely a visible green tint. I looked at the RGB parade on my smallHD and all three channels appeared to be even(or at least very close to even). I expected to see a slight elevation in the green ch, but there didn't appear to be one. I then white balanced the camera and the image "neutralized", as you'd expect, but I was expecting to see the green ch shift slightly, but instead the blue ch bumped up slightly. Also, the camera indicated a color temp closer to 3000K-3100K, than 3200K(But cameras don't give you dead on color meter readings, it's reference only). I then went back to preset 3200 and decided to see if I could "dial" the green out. I opened the app and went to the "color mixer" panel and dragged the point around while watching the monitor until white looked white(real accurate and scientific, huh?). Then I would white balance the camera and see what it told me. I was getting to where I was repeatedly hitting 3400 and 3200 by eye and the camera in preset looked good. This tells me that the green can be "dialed out" and Hive should be able to issue a firmware update to take care of it. At the higher color temps of 4300K and 5600K, there did not appear to be the green push and the light looked nice and clean(but I am going to re-evaluate that to be safe). The big thing that I have not been able to do yet, that is probably the most important, is check skin-tones. I know, how in the hell can you review a light and not cover how skin tones are rendered? As soon as I can talk my GF into sitting down and modeling for me(or if I take this light with me on my shoot wed and have a chance to see), I'll let y'all know.
Moving onto the RGB/"Party Colors"... So far, it doesn't seem to really matter what the color temp is set to, if you're wanting the saturated "party colors", you just crank the saturation up to 100% and then adjust the hue. Of course there are almost limitless combinations with being able to adjust the saturation from 0%-100% and 360 degrees of hue adjustment, plus the dimming. You could get some pretty funky results on objects you shine the light on when adjusting the colors, because the colors are so "pure" and intense. I was playing around in the Blue range and got a very cool night-time/monochromatic look going.
What I'd like to see added/addressed by Hive:
1) "Fix" the green push at 3200K. Yes, it can be "dialed out" and stored as a preset, but we shouldn't have to. This seems to be a very easy firmware update fix.
2) Add a similar feature to the LED Kino's(presuming it's not a contract thing) that lets you select colors by gel swatch numbers from LEE, GAM, etc..., including cosmetic gels.
3) Add a specialty adjustment for green/magenta +/- shift.
Even though I've only had a little while to play with the light, and not even in a real world production environment yet, I'm pretty pleased. I'm still a die-hard tungsten guy for people, but RGB/W fixtures are definitely going to be something you want to have in your toolbox.
This isn't an in-depth technical review with charts, pictures and numbers, etc. Just my initial impressions and thoughts after playing with it for a little while.
I did not order any additional accessories with mine, so it was just the basic light kit which consisted of the actual light itself, the yolk, reflector, barn doors, 3x holographic lenses in a storage pouch/bag, the power supply and an extension cable(header cable) from the power supply to the 100-C and the instruction booklet. I also received the goodies that came with being a kickstarter backer(T-shirt, sunglasses, etc.).
The light itself seems to be well made and heavy duty, which you can tell once you pick it up and feel it in your hands. I was a little concerned with the reflector, because it looked kind of "dainty" in pictures, but the frame is solid, just like the light body. The reflector twists ON and OFF very easily with with about a 1/4 turn. On the top ear that swivels to allow mounting of the barn doors and lenses, it has a spring loaded pin so that the ear can be "locked" in place. For this to work, though, you have to turn the ear 180 degrees opposite of what feels natural(I think it's a design flaw/oversight). The holographic lenses don't have a big ring to grab them by, like a lot of other lenses for light fixtures, but the 100-C isn't putting out nearly the amount of heat a tungsten or HMI fixture is, either. I sorta fixed the problem with a set of zipper-pulls, btw. The yolk is a pretty neat design. Not only does it tilt like you would expect, but you can loosen the main body of it and slide the light forward or backwards to help counterbalance any large or heavy front mounted accessories and you can rotate it/spin it, too. The body is also indexed to make it easy to return it to a certain specific fore or aft position. You can also easily and completely remove the 100-C from the yolk. This opens up a lot of flexibility for mounting it in weird or tight places and for ease in packing, too. The back of the light has all of the local controls and ports mounted there: 4-pin XLR power IN, DMX IN, DMX OUT, POWER Switch, DMX/Local control switch, Display Screen, two control knobs, Power Indicator light, DMX indicator light and a Mini-USB port for updates. The power supply looks like an off-the-shelf piece with a several foot long 4-pin XLR cable permanently attached on one end and a removable two-prong A/C cable on the other. The power supply is heavy and actually longer than the light itself, if the reflector was removed. This is one thing I definitely dis-like about a lot of(most) LED fixtures: the external power supply.
Local control of the light is fairly straight forward. Plug it in and turn the power switch on. A few moments after switching the light on, it comes to life in the last state that it was in when it was previously on(power level, CCT, etc.). On the screen, there are four settings indicated: top left "S" for saturation; top right "H" for hue; bottom left "D" for dimming; bottom right "K" for white light color temp(It is "C" when in DMX mode).
From the body, there are only two controls to make adjustments with: two knobs, one to the left and one to the right of the screen. The left knob toggles between the different adjustments and the right makes the adjustments(left is - and right +). Turning the right knob makes coarse adjustments and pushing it in while turning makes fine adjustments.
They also have a pretty good iPhone app for complete control over the light, as well. Unlike some of the other lights out there that use Bluetooth, the 100-C has it's Bluetooth on always when the light is powered, this makes it much more useable. Once you have used the app for the first time with an individual light and have saved it to memory, all you have to do each subsequent time is turn bluetooth ON on your phone(if it's not on already) and open the app and select the light(it will automatically show available lights and their status(power consumption, color, dimming level, etc.). No pairing each time like with the Astra modules. It has two control screens. The first could be considered the "fine control" screen. It has the name of the individual light(user adjustable) and a group name(if you have multiple lights in a set-up) and sliders and "+" "-" buttons and numerical readings for each adjustment(Saturation, Hue, Dimming, CCT). There are also five "buttons" at the bottom that can store the setting of the light completely(CCT, Dimming, Hue, Sat) so that you can instantly recall settings(i.e: 3200 @ 40% dimming, 5600 @ 100% dimming level, etc.). The buttons change colors to correspond to their settings(i.e: lower color temps are more orange, higher more white and "party colors" are that color). It has five settings that are stored in the light and five in the app, so you could have ten presets accessible from the app. There is also a button labeled "commissioning" that takes you to the second page that is a "color mixing" page that lets you just drag your finger across the boxes to adjust Dimming, CCT and the Hue/Sat box for making any color you want. And it adjusts in real time on the light. At the top of the page is a rectangle that shows/represents the exact color you have chosen and it gives you it's numerical dimming, saturation, hue and CCT value.
So, so far we can see that Hive has given us a fairly well-built unit with easy to use controls and a pretty darn good control app. But what about what's really important, the quality of the light itself...
Again, this isn't a super-scientific test with charts and meters and world-renowned DP's and gaffers, just me. To see how well the light was going to be on-camera, I went with one of my workhorse P2 VariCams and a smallHD DP7Pro OLED monitor. To evaluate the "white light" of the 100-C, I set the camera to preset(3200, 4300, 5600) and the light to the corresponding color temp and evaluated how it looked to my eye on the monitor. Then I would do a white balance on the camera and look at the image again.
First, the bad news. I'm sure a lot of people saw the LED light shootout that Timur Civan did on No Film School and the disappointing 3200 results that the 100-C put up. Well, the light does have a green push at 3200. With my VariCam at 3200 preset and the 100-C dialed into 3200(SAT:000, HUE: 000), there was definitely a visible green tint. I looked at the RGB parade on my smallHD and all three channels appeared to be even(or at least very close to even). I expected to see a slight elevation in the green ch, but there didn't appear to be one. I then white balanced the camera and the image "neutralized", as you'd expect, but I was expecting to see the green ch shift slightly, but instead the blue ch bumped up slightly. Also, the camera indicated a color temp closer to 3000K-3100K, than 3200K(But cameras don't give you dead on color meter readings, it's reference only). I then went back to preset 3200 and decided to see if I could "dial" the green out. I opened the app and went to the "color mixer" panel and dragged the point around while watching the monitor until white looked white(real accurate and scientific, huh?). Then I would white balance the camera and see what it told me. I was getting to where I was repeatedly hitting 3400 and 3200 by eye and the camera in preset looked good. This tells me that the green can be "dialed out" and Hive should be able to issue a firmware update to take care of it. At the higher color temps of 4300K and 5600K, there did not appear to be the green push and the light looked nice and clean(but I am going to re-evaluate that to be safe). The big thing that I have not been able to do yet, that is probably the most important, is check skin-tones. I know, how in the hell can you review a light and not cover how skin tones are rendered? As soon as I can talk my GF into sitting down and modeling for me(or if I take this light with me on my shoot wed and have a chance to see), I'll let y'all know.
Moving onto the RGB/"Party Colors"... So far, it doesn't seem to really matter what the color temp is set to, if you're wanting the saturated "party colors", you just crank the saturation up to 100% and then adjust the hue. Of course there are almost limitless combinations with being able to adjust the saturation from 0%-100% and 360 degrees of hue adjustment, plus the dimming. You could get some pretty funky results on objects you shine the light on when adjusting the colors, because the colors are so "pure" and intense. I was playing around in the Blue range and got a very cool night-time/monochromatic look going.
What I'd like to see added/addressed by Hive:
1) "Fix" the green push at 3200K. Yes, it can be "dialed out" and stored as a preset, but we shouldn't have to. This seems to be a very easy firmware update fix.
2) Add a similar feature to the LED Kino's(presuming it's not a contract thing) that lets you select colors by gel swatch numbers from LEE, GAM, etc..., including cosmetic gels.
3) Add a specialty adjustment for green/magenta +/- shift.
Even though I've only had a little while to play with the light, and not even in a real world production environment yet, I'm pretty pleased. I'm still a die-hard tungsten guy for people, but RGB/W fixtures are definitely going to be something you want to have in your toolbox.
