New Led Fresnel Fixture from Kinotehnik - Practilite 602

legrevedotcom said:
I just bought 3 Area 48 Soft Lights. The build quality is as great as the light quality. But people are still a bit biased because they remember the awful 1st gen Litepanels and their colour spike, something that is almost gone in remote phosphor. Also the panels make them act like a single source.
Erik Naso just posted a few images of the latest Westcott product but those lights have clearly visible LEDs when used on reflective surfaces....

The worst part with the Area 48s is having to chip out on all those damn accessories. But those Kinotek... Cri 90-93 :S that's not really that great anymore. Area 48 phosphor lights are coming in at 97 and their new tubes which will rival Kino Flo and Ice Light will come in at 98 and 99 in daylight and tungsten respectively.
Click to expand...

I see 96 CRI for the Kinotehnik lights on their website. Where are you getting the 90-93 figures from?

Edit: Nevermind, I see that others have already raised the same question with some actual measurements to go along with it.
 
ozmorphasis said:
I see 96 CRI for the Kinotehnik lights on their website. Where are you getting the 90-93 figures from?

Edit: Nevermind, I see that others have already raised the same question with some actual measurements to go along with it.
Click to expand...

Those values were from the initial NAB2015 prototypes and according video interviews...
... Don't forget, CRI can be faked really easily but TLCI can be not.
 
I like the Practilites. I own two now, and will likely buy a third.

I'll start with the bad. One of them got stuck to my new Matthews light stand and I had to pry it off with a wrench, which was quite a pain; for awhile I thought I'd have to send both the light and the stand back to B&H since I couldn't get it off, but WD-40 and a wrench with another person helping did the trick. I'm not sure if it resulted from a flaw in the light mount or the light stand mount. I had a production assistant trying to take the light off when it got stuck, so perhaps they pushed down on it too hard resulting in it getting stuck.

Then shortly after I got it off (like 10 minutes), I plugged it into a dying Anton Bauer battery (I'd used Anton Bauer batteries before with it), and the light died. Stopped working. I later smelled it and it smelled like some electronics got burned inside, like, the same smell was there days later. Wouldn't turn on or anything. I believe after all the jostling to get it off the light stand that it was still working for a little bit, but not positive about that. I suppose the jostling could have effected it somehow, but I don't see how grabbing the metal light strongly would have caused it to burn up on the inside. I'm guessing the battery somehow overloaded the light with power or something. I don't know. It was a p-tap to 5-pin XLR cable.

So, I returned it to B&H and bought another one. Why? Because they're awesome!

They're made of all metal on the outside (I think the knobs are plastic), so seem quite durable. The wireless bluetooth feature is awesome. No more running back and forth from the camera to the light to adjust the brightness of the hair light while the (bigshot CEO) interviewee is waiting awkwardly thinking you're a moron to keep going back and for to adjust a..."hair light?". I just bought bluetooth add-ons for all three of my Lightpanel Astras, so I'll be able to control brightness and color temperature on all five of my LEDs from my phone. And run them off of batteries. And they're all bi-color. I think after getting used to that it will be hard to go back to using non-wireless lighting.

The App for the bluetooth also works pretty smoothly, better than it works on the Astras, as it automatically connects to the lights, whereas with the Astras you have to manually connect each light to the bluetooth, which is stupid and takes an extra 15 seconds to do, and on the Astras if you loose connection, which sometimes changes the light's settings (brightness and color temp), and then you have to reconnect, which is also stupid, but the Practilite has none of these bluetooth issues and the App works well.

I've used the Practilite for over an hour at around 70-100% with no issues which a review on B&H mentioned about them not working on full power for a long time. I gather that reviewer on B&H may have gotten a bad light, after which a replacement would solve his issue. Perhaps there is some quality control problems since one of my lights went bad too. I need to check their warranty; hopefully it's good. Fortunately my light went bad before the 30 day return period at B&H was up, so I didn't have to deal with sending it to the manufacturer.

The fan on the Practilite is a little louder than the fan on the Astra, which concerned me a little at first, but I don't think it's loud enough to be an issue in most locations where ambient noise is likely to be louder.

I was considering the new Dedolight DLED7 Turbo as a third small LED Fresnel, with the advantages it has being a more variable beam angle with better focusing and a cleaner barn door cut, along with a heat sink setup which I think means it has no fan (and thus no fan noise). It should be around the same level of brightness with its 90 watt max power draw. However, after getting used to the bluetooth technology, like I said, I don't think I'll be able to live without it, so I may get a third Practilite 602.

The barn door cut probably isn't as good as my Dedo DLH4 (what is?), but it's much better than a Lowel Pro light, and importantly, is good enough that I have no issues using it as a hair light where I need a fairly precise barn door cut. I've also used it as a background light. One thing I don't like about the barn doors is that they come off too easy; this typically isn't as much of an issue while operating them, more so when taking them in and out of the bag; a simple tightening knob on the barn doors could solve this issue. Perhaps in the future they'll sell an updated barn door option that solves the issue.

You can hop over the Lightpanel Astra SOFT topic to see various behind-the-scenes photos and interview frame grabs of the Practilite 602 in action: http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthrea...-Panel&p=1986619989&viewfull=1#post1986619989
 
Thank you for the awesome feedback so you really find that it only has the brightness usable as a hair light at this point or in a smaller situation could you use them as a key but with the room would have to be darker in order to have that work?
 
Hi Toenis,

Will the LED emitters be upgradeable in the 602 should brighter ones come available? If so would it be a user installable or require sending back to you?
 
wbrock001 said:
Thank you for the awesome feedback so you really find that it only has the brightness usable as a hair light at this point or in a smaller situation could you use them as a key but with the room would have to be darker in order to have that work?
Click to expand...
I could possibly see using it as a key light shooting through an umbrella for event style run n' gun interviews, where the bi-color option would be handy, and at around 2-3 lbs it's a lot lighter than various 1x1 LED panels. Typically in those situation you're balancing with ambient convention lighting so don't need a lot of brightness. I may prefer a Lightpanel Astra Soft, though, unless weight was a concern.

I also plan to use the Practilite as a key and fill light for wedding toasts running off of AB batteries.

Without doing any tests, I'd guess using it as a key light through one stop diffusion would put you around f/2.8 at ISO 850. It's said to be a 350w tungsten equivalent, while the Astras are said to be 1K equivalents. I like to shoot sit-down interviews around f/4-f/5.6 for the tight shots, but some people like their shots out of focus (ahem, I mean shallow). There's also the matter of balancing the light with a window background, which the Astras being around 2x or 3x as bright do a better job of, or 4x to 6x as bright if you use a pair of Astras as I've done when fighting window light.

So no, I probably wouldn't spend $1000 to use a Practilite as the only key light in your kit for sit-down interviews (I'd get an Astra), but as a hair light, background light, rim light, run n' gun key light, etc., it's quite useful.
 
About replacing the emitter in Practilite 602

About replacing the emitter in Practilite 602

wbrock001 said:
Hi Toenis,

Will the LED emitters be upgradeable in the 602 should brighter ones come available? If so would it be a user installable or require sending back to you?
Click to expand...
Sorry that I didn't notice the question once it was posted. It's a good question because the hardware of the Practilites is of highest possible quality and in some 4 years for example new emitters will appear with better efficiency (currently high CRI emitters have 70-90% efficiency whereas low CRI have up to 200% - which is quite a bit in terms of total optical flux)
The emitters in Practilite 602 and 600 can be replaced only by our service center in USA or at our headquarters in Europe.
Changing the LED emitter involves also replacing the COB LED holder which is attached to the power controller PCB.
After that the light will be calibrated and new software will be written for each fixture so that the light levels and color balance values will match other lights using that same new LED emitter.

Sorry again for the late reply,
Toenis
 
Last edited:
Eric Coughlin said:
I could possibly see using it as a key light shooting through an umbrella for event style run n' gun interviews, where the bi-color option would be handy, and at around 2-3 lbs it's a lot lighter than various 1x1 LED panels. Typically in those situation you're balancing with ambient convention lighting so don't need a lot of brightness. I may prefer a Lightpanel Astra Soft, though, unless weight was a concern.
Click to expand...
To follow up on this, I've been using this light for run n' gun interviews and am quite happy with the setup. Smaller and lighter than a 1 x 1, the umbrella folds down for smaller size for when we're on the move, and bright enough to work with ambient light. A lot of times producers are the ones carrying my light while I carry the camera, so I'm sure they appreciate the lighter weight as well. Here is a photo of my setup.

Also have a Sanken CS3-e on a mic stand, which is a great mic for convention type shoots. So much better than a lav, being very directional, I can aim it upwards, and it isolates well, and I don't have to worry about spending time laving up each person, or the lav being in the shot.

Full-size image: http://i.imgur.com/pbj7Yep.jpg
View attachment 119762

Here is a frame grab of an interview subject being lit with just (no other ambient light on her face) this setup (Practlite with an umbrella), along with ambient light in the distant background. If I want the light softer, I sometimes reverse the umbrella and use it as a bounce; don't recall which setup I did for this shot; guessing I bounced it.

Full-size image: http://www.imageupload.co.uk/images/2017/01/03/PractliiteFrameGrab1.jpg
View attachment 119763
 
Last edited:
swphotovideo said:
Nice. I've got one of the 602's on its way to me today. The review has left me feeling comfortable about the purchase decision.
Click to expand...

Let me know how you like it. As a designer and engineer behind this product I'm kind of curious.

Here is a nice article on how few Practilite 604s were part of The F-Word lighting setup.
 
Last edited:
Toenis said:
Let me know how you like it. As a designer and engineer behind this product I'm kind of curious.
Click to expand...

Toenis,

Owned a Practilite 602 for about a year, in which time it’s travelled around the globe, & so far served me well.

Love the design, construction, & intuitive app, so hoping substantially brighter Fresnels are added to the lineup.
 
Last edited:
Hi Toenis, very happy with the light.

Has the barndoor design been updated? Some reviews I saw mentioned they can easily fall off, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

For my interviews I've been using an Aputure 120D as a key, so I'm yet to see if the Practilite plays nice with it as a fill light. Even if it doesn't, I'll still have a lot of uses for the light.
 
Had a chance to use the Practilite on a job yesterday. It was my first attempt at background lighting. I didn't quite nail the position of the light. Should have gone for a lower angle and had the light front on to avoid the elongated plant shadow, but definitely looks way better than it would have with no background lighting. Loving this light.
 

Attachments

  • FB_IMG_1509666281763.jpg
    FB_IMG_1509666281763.jpg
    35.9 KB · Views: 0
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top