Barry_Green
Moderator
Someone showed me this light they found at the Armato's booth. It looks very cool! It looks almost exactly like a Frezzi mini-fill, but it has a power tap that plugs into a Sony-compatible battery.
http://www.armatosvideo.com/pdetails.asp?itemID=10654
The battery is a regular camera battery, but it has a power tap plug on it that drives the light also. With the battery they supply, and the LCD panel open, and the light on full, you get about 2.5 hours of runtime. Not bad at all, and no bulky battery belt to wear. And it includes the barn doors, the diffuser, and the dichroic. And the light's focusable too -- not a true dimmer, but a spot/flood focus control which works pretty well and actually ends up serving a similar purpose as a dimmer anyway. It's only 10 watts, but they have a nice reflector design which gives it a boost (they claim it's as bright as a 20w light). They demonstrated it from 10 feet away on a guy in the somewhat-lit convention hall, and I'll admit it was making a definite difference, definitely lighting the subject up.
It really looks like a killer deal -- I spent upwards of $800 on my 75w Frezzi and 2-hr battery belt, and this little light is similarly equipped, looks about the same, but includes the battery, doesn't need a belt, and goes for $490.
I of course asked him when he'd have a Panasonic version available, and he said "well, we have to figure out the batteries"... heh. So I put him in touch with Jarred. We'll see if they can come up with something, but right now it's on the market and available for FX1/Z1 owners.
I have no relationship to Armato's, I just thought it looked like a great little light and I told them I'd write up something here to let people know about it.
http://www.armatosvideo.com/pdetails.asp?itemID=10654
The battery is a regular camera battery, but it has a power tap plug on it that drives the light also. With the battery they supply, and the LCD panel open, and the light on full, you get about 2.5 hours of runtime. Not bad at all, and no bulky battery belt to wear. And it includes the barn doors, the diffuser, and the dichroic. And the light's focusable too -- not a true dimmer, but a spot/flood focus control which works pretty well and actually ends up serving a similar purpose as a dimmer anyway. It's only 10 watts, but they have a nice reflector design which gives it a boost (they claim it's as bright as a 20w light). They demonstrated it from 10 feet away on a guy in the somewhat-lit convention hall, and I'll admit it was making a definite difference, definitely lighting the subject up.
It really looks like a killer deal -- I spent upwards of $800 on my 75w Frezzi and 2-hr battery belt, and this little light is similarly equipped, looks about the same, but includes the battery, doesn't need a belt, and goes for $490.
I of course asked him when he'd have a Panasonic version available, and he said "well, we have to figure out the batteries"... heh. So I put him in touch with Jarred. We'll see if they can come up with something, but right now it's on the market and available for FX1/Z1 owners.
I have no relationship to Armato's, I just thought it looked like a great little light and I told them I'd write up something here to let people know about it.
