Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Log in
  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

The Zylight

Rick Darge

Rick Darge

Banned
Joined
Dec 29, 2006
Messages
3,775
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
44
I've heard a few Redusers saying very positive things about the Zylight, specifically the Z90 version. I don't like to use eyelights normally, but this thing seems pretty awesome, especially for the size and also the color control without gels. Thoughts?
 
Wow that looks pretty cool...I wonder what its CRI is like? A big one (like the Litepanel 1x1) would be awesome...
 
The Zylight is a great little unit and far more color-accurate than a standard Litepanel type device. I like it not just for an on-camera light but also as a clever little stash light (it's so small) or edge light as it can be instantly dialed to whatever color you need. Great for exterior city nights where there's a great variety of color to the lighting anyway so you choose what you wish to match and dial it in.

Abel sells Zylight as do others.
 
Mitch Gross said:
The Zylight is a great little unit and far more color-accurate than a standard Litepanel type device. I like it not just for an on-camera light but also as a clever little stash light (it's so small) or edge light as it can be instantly dialed to whatever color you need. Great for exterior city nights where there's a great variety of color to the lighting anyway so you choose what you wish to match and dial it in.

Abel sells Zylight as do others.
Click to expand...

Hey Mitch,

How do you find light output from Zylight Z90?

It has been absolute nightmare to compare LED lights from various manufacturers as nearly all, instead of giving luminous output or efficacy, tend to say: "1000W equivalent", "600W equivalent", "the brightest light ever made" or "produces no heat" ...and all other sorts of marketing BS.

Because you sell and use most of the brands, could you give us somewhat independent feedback of which LED lights are the brightest/most efficient and how their light output compares wth a typical tungsten or HMI lights?

I would really like to drop in and try them at Abel, but you don't have a shop in Sydney (yet) :biggrin:
 
I'll try and get to a comparison when I can. It can be difficult as it is a bit Apples v. Oranges, especially when the quality of light (diffuse, directional, etc.) is so different. Please note that the Zylight is a very small light.
 
Mitch Gross said:
I'll try and get to a comparison when I can. It can be difficult as it is a bit Apples v. Oranges, especially when the quality of light (diffuse, directional, etc.) is so different.
Click to expand...

Yes, I know. A rough, but useful, way would be to illuminate the same area and simply measure the lux (foot candle) reading. To do this you would need to project the light from various distances, depending on beam angle (which would be good to know too). So, say you would be lighting 3m x 3m square, the comparison table could look like this:

BRAND LUX DISTANCE (ANGLE) COLOUR TEMP

Yes, I am aware Z90 is small. But, it is still ~30W, which makes it medium-large power LED and it could be useful for lighting variety of subects.
 
  • Thread starter
  • Banned
  • #8
So I just got back from Abel in Los Angeles. I spent about an hour playing around with the Z90 model. Everything looked great except one Major issue.. For me it was a dealbreaker.. I'm surprised I haven't heard anyone talk about this problem either..

If you are shooting a subject in front of a whitish wall, the edges of their shadow will contain a hint of RGB. You will see this subtle rainbow effect only at the edges of the shadow. There are actually four subtle shadows that I noticed, an overwhelming dark/regular shadow, then a subtle red, blue and green shadow, overlayed on top of the dark/regular. I hope I'm visually describing this correctly..

At first I thought it was a faulty unit. My sales rep opened up a brand new one that exhibited the same issue.

For news gathering, I don't see this being that big of an issue, but for film, I don't want to take the risk.

The concept of the Zylight sounds awesome but I think they still have some things to work on with their tech.

Looks like its Litepanels for me..
 
I own the Z90 and it is great. Dialing in color temps, then having the range to go through almost any color imaginable, matching any kind of neon you may run into in a city/bar. I wouldn't use it to light somebody standing against a white wall (there isn't any light that I want to use on somebody standing against a white wall), but that isn't a big loss.

It will get hot to the touch if you have it on for more than 5 minutes. The output seems a little better than the lightpanels, but it is the versatility that really makes it shine over the LP.
 
Anyone else find this shadow rainbow problem a big issue? I thought it was pretty noticable.
 
Whenever you have multiple light emitters in a single light source unit (as is any LED light) you will have the problem of multiple shadows. Because the LEDs in the Zylight are different colors you then get these different shadows in different colors. If you diffuse the light source by even a tiny amount (such as Hampshire diffusion which is extremely weak diffusion) then the multiple shadow issue is eliminated.
 
Mitch Gross said:
Whenever you have multiple light emitters in a single light source unit (as is any LED light) you will have the problem of multiple shadows. Because the LEDs in the Zylight are different colors you then get these different shadows in different colors. If you diffuse the light source by even a tiny amount (such as Hampshire diffusion which is extremely weak diffusion) then the multiple shadow issue is eliminated.
Click to expand...

I was comparing spectrum response of Z90 with that of Red sensor and they seem to be closely "aligned" at R, G, B peaks. Have you noticed Z90 giving somewhat higher contrast images ('less muddy") than some other lights that have continuous spectrum?
 
I have not but will admit that I have not specifically tested this light with the Red One.
 
Mitch can you comment on the RGB shadows going away with a little diffusion. I still think RGB shadows are unacceptable, but that's just me.
 
Your light source will diffuse and your shadows blend. It's as simple as that even in RGB.
 
Yes, but then I need to add diffusion to fix an issue. To the best of my knowledge the LPs don't cast multiple shadows in the same fashion as the Zylight. The Zylight seems like everything I want in an LED light but after seeing those RGB shadows, I was a bit thrown off, as was my AbelCine sales rep.
 
I understand your concern and I guess in certain situations (lighting something with a white or light colored background close behind) this could be not so good. I just haven't used it in that way. It isn't something that is going to come across on skin tones.
 
Thats good to hear. Newspeak, do you have any examples online, video, where you've used the Zylight? And have you used the Litepanels before? At first glance, the Zylight did seem to have more of a PUNCH when compared to a Litepanel. Zylight is a slightly harder light in my opinion.
 
A bit of Hampshire Frost might reduce that multi-colored penumbra shadow. I use a 4x4 of Hampshire in front of FAY's to "fuse" the separate bulbs into a single light source.

Mitch, I find the method used by Mole-Richardson to be a fair means of comparing luminaires. They measure FC at the center of the beam and describe beam angle as the point at which FC falls to 50% from the center. If an instrument can change beam width, Mole lists both the spot and flood measurements.

The Zylight might benefit from the addition of 3200K and 5600K measurements.

I also like the illumination diagrams designed by Lowel. I keep a page on my site of the specs for all my lights:

http://austinfilmtools.com/pages/gear_light_comparison.htm

Michael
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top