Zylight F8 LED Fresnel

W

wbrock001@hotmail.com

Member
I just received an email from zylight talking about their f8 fresnel led that outputs equivalent of 650 W using 90 watts power input. Each light unit can only do 3200 or 5600, it's not color temp adjustable like their other lights. It's also in a really compact body with true fresnel lens...silent operation and low heat...sounds great right! Well then I get to pricing, I'm thinking around a thousand since its mono temp output. Well as they said in their email it's "set at a very competitive $2400.00 US." I literally had a physical reaction kind of like when I saw the price of the kinflo celeb 200. $2400 for a single light, that you can't even change color temp, that only outputs maybe 650 W of light, and we know they almost never really do match their "equivalents." So a set of three lights would be $7200. I'm just awestruck how these manufacturers keep releasing single lights that cost almost as much as cameras. Anyway my rant is over, I think that light will only be in the domain of rental houses and maybe some spendy television network. There are so many decent alternatives with more flexibility I just don't get their pricing. Any thoughts?
 
I have a very rudimentary understanding of why certain features found in cameras can be pricy. And I get it...I think I do anyway.

I have yet to understand why lighting equipment is so costly. I have looked at prices for most parts required to build your own (say) fresnel LED, and it didn't add up to the "very competitive" price of $2000+. that was a while ago though.

Either I overlooked something, or they charge that price because they can.
 
Hey folks,


Thanks for the feedback. We do all we can to keep our costs down (booth made out of pallets?!) and pass the savings on to the consumer while not compromising build quality and durability of our products. Providing you with reliable and useful lighting equipment is our top priority. We invite you to compare the output and build quality of our lights with the Arri or others. In fact, here is link to a helpful chart to guide your comparison: http://www.zylight.com/support/photometrics/.

Also, please keep this in mind if you're considering spending near $2k on a LED Fresnel: Thin plastic and crudely bent sheet metal are no substitute for glass and aluminum. Arri has a very good build quality, but definitely use caution when considering other big-box LED Fresnels.

Let's keep this discussion going!


- Jim & Charlie & the Zylight Team
 
Zylight said:
Let's keep this discussion going!
Click to expand...

I guess I'm just old fashion and a tight wad.
My choice of 650w Fresnel? A used Mole Twennie II with doors & scrim set off ebay for $227.
My choice of a 1K Fresnel? A used Mole 407 with doors & scrim set off ebay for $150.
My choice of a 2K Fresnel? A used Mole 412 with doors & scrim set off ebay for $200.
I'm sure you produce a nice product, but $2400 is more than a frugal guy like me is willing to pay for a single light.

All the Best!

Dave
 
The Arri is a great product - and has come down in price considerably since it was released. Here in the UK, it's roughy 3 times the price of a normnal halogen fixture of the same brightness(well - close).

The thing that worries me is the progression in LED designs, and the ARRI has a replaceable light source, ready for when a better/more efficient LED source becomes available. Building this in as a feature is basically ARRI saying "we know there will be brighter ones next year, so we can sell you a better one then".

So you are buying a product, knowing it will be updatable (at a cost of course) later on. A bit scary for an expensive product!
 
paulears said:
Here in the UK, it's roughy 3 times the price of a normnal halogen fixture of the same brightness
Click to expand...

For me, the BIG deal with LED lighting is DAYLIGHT balance, where you compare a daylight LED light source against a FULL CTB GELLED tungsten, and the output difference becomes huge. ( then there's also the HUGE heat difference when it comes time to pack-up and move to the next location )

Otherwise, you have to compare HMI daylight sources against LED daylight sources, and I think the LED still wins in terms of size / weight / heat / price compared to an HMI equivalent.
 
Thanks to zylight for participating! I guess if you compare to what the others are charging, zylight's price is "competitive." But that's the big problem is that all of them are charging way too much for those lights. Just like arri and mole charge way too much for hmi lights. I realize there are research and dev costs, sourcing parts, machining etc...but with all due respect these lights are just ridiculously high. Quality LEDs and dimming power supplies and aluminum and glass just aren't that expensive. The next question is what average videographer has the money for these lights given the state of the economy and our industry? LEDs should be reducing cost of gear not exponentially increasing it.

My local dealer has a kino celeb for demo...I was the only one that demo'd it...the others they asked just said why bother once they heard the price they knew they wouldn't buy one. If the zylight or celeb were about half the price I might consider, but we all know that isn't going to happen. For the price of one zylight or celeb I could buy a sound devices pix 240 and there is no way zylight or kino can say their product costs as much to develop or produce as a pix 240...
 
Last edited:
Of all the led options the zylight definitely looks to be an innovative design for users. I love how small it packs up.
Have you guys looked into lep (plasma) lighting technology?
Would be amazing to have a similar style small, focusable fresnel light with the higher output of plasma (actually competes with hmi).
 
paulears said:
The Arri is a great product - and has come down in price considerably since it was released. Here in the UK, it's roughy 3 times the price of a normnal halogen fixture of the same brightness(well - close).

The thing that worries me is the progression in LED designs, and the ARRI has a replaceable light source, ready for when a better/more efficient LED source becomes available. Building this in as a feature is basically ARRI saying "we know there will be brighter ones next year, so we can sell you a better one then".

So you are buying a product, knowing it will be updatable (at a cost of course) later on. A bit scary for an expensive product!
Click to expand...

That is also very much worth noticing. Now that Zylight has joined in, can you elaborate if you offer the same thing in your product? Would also be lovely to see some actual tests to see how the quality of light looks.
 
It occurs to me that some things cost a lot for what they are because of limited target market. If you design a product for a limited professional market as opposed to a consumer market you are going to sell many fewer units. It's got to factor in. That said, I don't have $2400 for a 650 LED fresnel but that doesn't mean that someone doesn't. I'd LOVE to have a couple of big gun HMIs but at the moment they are prohibitive except to rent. Cinema lenses are like, real dollies are like that.

Just saying that if the manufacturers could sell for less, cover costs, make a profit, I think they would. I don't think you can look at the parts and say it can't be worth it. I used to feel that way about the Divas that cost me, what I considered, a lot but every time I hang those things I'm glad I have them, corrugated plastic and all.
 
Last edited:
wbrock001@hotmail.com said:
But that's the big problem is that all of them are charging way too much for those lights. Just like arri and mole charge way too much for hmi lights.
Click to expand...

...You can only say that they charge too much if there is a better low cost alternative, otherwise all you are saying is that you can't afford this type of light source.

So if we look at what these lights do:

- Daylight balance
- High light output
- Optical lens with variable light spread
- Compact size
- Low operating temperature
- Low power draw

...Is there a better lower cost alternative that does all of these things?

Myself, I can't think of a cheaper light that has all of these features, so I would never say that they are charging too much, but rather this type of light is beyond my limited budget.

I would love to own a set of LED daylight balanced fresnels, but for now I have to settle for something within my budget like the FloLight 1024 LED light source ( $800 each ), which is a completely different type of daylight balanced LED light source.
 
My guess is that lighting companies still calculate for a rental market. Rentalhouses pay them one time, and then make money for years with their development. So prices for fixtures have to mirror that. While this system is still in use, the field has broadened, because of the "digital revolution" in the camera sector. People who either had to rent or just couldn´t get access to a "real camera", could buy the DVX and shoot movies. The 5DII made filmmaking even more accessible.
There are more small production houses, more freelance cameramen and they all need lights. The dilemma now is: Will those people be the early adopters and all buy the Zylight if they´d sell it at half the current price?
Or will rental houses just cut their rates for the fixtures in half and make renting even more attractive (and thus cutting the manufacturers profit in half)?
The risk is with the manufacturers, so I guess pricing will only change if companies from the "new markets" catch up and offer similar value at lower costs. Rant over;)
 
A colleague of mine has had good luck with these hmi lights http://www.alzovideo.com/alzo_800_hmi_cool_lite.htm Are they as rugged as Arri or Mole, don't know, but I do know that I can buy about 10 of them for the cost of one of theirs. So while ruggedness is great, then I guess the Zylights and such will fill a smaller niche for those who specifically need those features and have the money for them. But if they could get the price lower and still meet their quality, I bet they'd sell a lot more of them...perhaps that isn't their business model. So fewer units sold at higher prices vs. a lot of units for lower prices.
 
One other important feature the Zylight F8 has, and I think is very important if one wants to compare apples with apples, and overlooked in it's feature list is:
YOU CAN RUN IT ON 14.4 V BATTERY POWER in the field without noisy generators and wires to trip on.

- Daylight balance
- High light output
- Optical lens with variable light spread
- Compact size
- Low operating temperature
- Low power draw
AND
- BATTERY POWERED

I don't think the Alzo HMI can run on batteries.
 
There is so many markets one can approach and each market has different priorities in their purchases. For many hobbyist it's the price, for pros it's reliability, for rental its ruggedness. Zylight looks like a specialty light so talking about it as if it's suppose to substitute your old Arri 650 is a bit pointless.
 
Specialty Light?

It would be interesting for Jim & Charlie to chime in on where they see this light being used.

Currently I own around 45 Tungsten lights, 3 HMI lights, 20 Fluorescent lights, and 5 LED lights.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top