Need advice: Cool lights or Dedolight?

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diegocervo

Well-known member
Hi all,

I'm about to buy a kit of led lights and I'd like to hear pros and, most important, cons from Cool Lights and Dedolight users.
Actually, the products I'm considering are the CL-Led600 and the Dedolight Felloni High Output, both daylight.

Apart from the CRI, which is a little higher on the Dedolight (84 vs 80) and the lack of a remote wired dimmer on the CL, how do these units perform in everyday life? Is there any flickering when dimming down close to 0%? Are the CL rough enough, since they are supposed
to follow me on many trips?

I'm supposed to do a demo of the Felloni next week, but I'm not sure I can wait too long for ordering and delivery because I have a shoot very soon and I need portable lights and batteries with me.
Fortunately money is not an issue, but of course I don't regret saving some bucks and going for Cool Lights if they are worthy :)

Thanks a lot for any help!
Best,
Diego
 
I wouldn't hesitate to choose the Cool Lights. Great company, and the owner is very active on this forum. I think the CL-led600 is out of stock right now though.
 
Thanks for your interest. No flickering when dimming down to zero. The LED600 will be back in stock and shipping by this Wednesday. They are in warehouse now, just being processed into inventory along with all other items that are back now including: portable and studio fluorescents, LED 1200 bi-color, 1200w HMI par, 575 HMI fresnel and CDM 150 fresnels.
 
+1 for cool lights.

The Filini/TecPro stuff Dedolight sales cant be compared to the quality of their original lights.
The last "Dedo-Filini" LED I tested (small on camera light) was 100% identical with a cheap 49 bucks China light of ebay.
Only differences was the sticker and the price - Dedo sells thatsame light for over 200.

Pretty similar to original SnapOn tools and their BlueLine series.

Frank
 
Thanks Frank, good catch on that you are absolutely right. In addition, the Dedolight Felloni TecPro is definitely made in China. Says "Made in P.R.C." right on the back. LOL, I guess there would be some that don't know what P.R.C. means, so there's at least the chance some would think its made somewhere else; and since its Dedolight without looking at the label at all you could assume it was made in Germany.
 
If you are looking at a 1x1 daylight, then I agree with everyone else and get a cool light led600.

Have 2 of their 2x1 bicolors and they are awesome.

I also have 2 of the high output Felloni bicolor 1x1s and think they are great too.

Right now, cool lights doesn't offer a bicolor in a 1x1 although I'm sure he is working on one.

Most all of my shooting is in mixed lighting, so I have switched all of my LEDs to bicolor models.
 
Absolutely are working on a Bicolor 600. As always taking longer than I want. Didn't think that people would want the smaller sizes in Bicolor so didn't do it sooner. Now it appears to be very popular. I'll probably do a smaller unit than the LED 600 as well.
 
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Thank you all for the time you took to answer my questions.
I'll place on order with CL asap :)
Cheers,
Diego
 
Whats the difference/benefits to the bi-color lights rather than just bring gels? Just that you don't have to carry gels around? Or do gels cut down the light more than the bi-color leds? Do the bi-colors let you adjust the intensity of the tungsten so its easier to match in the field?
 
With gels, you are changing the color in a macro way, ie from 5600k to 3200K or some large amount in between.

When shooting in mixed lighting environments, you will often see the light fall somewhere in between, like 4250k.

In that case, the variable ability of bicolor lights to subtly change the ratio of brightness of the bluer vs the warmer LEDs give you finer control.
 
Even when using a single color temperature -- I'm mostly trying to shoot everything at 5600°K now -- having mixed types of LEDs in a light means that they can be designed to work together, so no single emitter has to cover the entire color spectrum evenly by itself. This can, in principle, make for a higher CRI and better lumens/watt efficiency than any one type of full-spectrum LED. How it works in practice depends greatly on how competently they're designed and the LEDs are selected, however. We really need a "Consumer Reports" type operation to measure the output, efficiency and color accuracy of a wide range of these instruments and give us some guidance on which ones perform best ...

Things seemed so simple when all lights had hot tungsten filaments!

- Greg
 
Resurrect this thread.
I'm looking at the cool lights as well, and I've read some great reviews. My main question is this: is the egg crate/softbox necessary for lighting interviews? I thought that the soft nature of a large light source was soft enough. Most of my lighting is lighting people for interviews, so any insight on which pieces of gear are best suited for that would be appreciated.
Thanks all.
 
LEDs are like a bunch of mini spotlights.

If you want to use them for your key light, I would recommend using some diffusion between the source and subject to soften the light out a little.
 
Dreadlington said:
I'm sold on the Cool Lights but I'm in the UK and can't find anywhere to get them from. Can anyone help?
Click to expand...

Perhaps you didn't notice you replied to a post from two and a half years ago?

Just drop cool lights an email from their contact page, they can let you know about distributors or shipping. They answer emails right away.
 
A bit surprised at the negative feedback on the Felloni LED lights. I've seen the YouTube demos and interviews and to me it looks like a top-notch product, in fact, I was looking to buy the Dedolight Dedocolor Felloni - Daylight 50° High Output. I bought an old set of Cool Lights ( LED panels ) and I am pretty sure they were made in China too. The Felloni LED lights just seems like a more robust and modern product:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13tN6gw5YQU

In a studio there are other options, but once you hook these babies up with an AB battery they open up a lot of options. I know cool lights also are portable, but I just checked out ther website and typing CL-LED600 gave me a " product not found " result. Went back to the Menu and clicked on "LED kits". Got "there are no products to list in this category". The 2 HMI models I found interesting were both "Out of Stock".
In contrast my local video distribuitor stocks the Felloni lights. That alone can save me $$ in import duties, never mind that they seem a more professional product.
 
I bought a pair of 50 degree Felloni bi-colors (used on this forum) and have been using them regularly for about a year. Excellent lights. When I don't have time or need for my larger sources, Chimeras or fluorescents, the Fellonis have really made lighting a pleasure, especially when I power them with 90wh v mount batts. I get over 3 hours of runtime. I also have been using Dedolight 150s with the built in dimmers for many, many years and they have proven to be invaluable. I have done many small jobs running just Dedo products with beautiful results.
 
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