Rotolight RL-48 LED Interview Lighting Kit V2

Comments about Rotolight RL-48 LED Interview Lighting Kit V2:

Great product for an amateur like me

The constant predictable light source makes

1-Metering exposure and the addition of flash much easier to handle , and

2-Gives instant feed back on the effect of the wonderful Lee filters and
"colour gels" supplied.

Comments about Rotolight RL-48 LED Interview Lighting Kit V2:

This great little product is more flexible than I thought. I have a Canon 5D and never use it for video. So I have only used these lights for still photography.

The Rotolight kit is great for lots of different usages including table studies, still life, portraits and macro works. Creative back lighting as a supplement for other main front/side lights also works well. I have still not found the end to the things I can do.

The light each one gives off is daylight balanced and it is well controlled. The kit has two lights. For the work I have done so far this has been essential in most uses (100W with both / 50W separately). Just exploring the different gels to fit these lights could provide hours of endless variations and themes. Apart from the creative gels there are gels to balance the ambient light (tungsten etc). This is a great help indoors. As there is no flash the light is less startling in cases where you are working with, say, pets or babies.

There are many ways these LED light sources can be mounted. Most you have to work out for yourself. There are precious few instructions - but they are not really necessary if you are creative. There are hot shoe attachments with each light but I find that the on-camera use is the lesser of the uses I have so far tried. The lights will fit onto tripods and light stands and so can be used flexibly.

I tend to do a lot of still life. I have two little compact tripods (5/6 inches tall) normally used on tables. These have been excellent in mounting the Rotolights for still life work. You can buy these little tripods for a few pounds and are a great way to enhance the flexibility of the kit. I think both of my tiny tripods were freebies with magazine subscriptions. Perhaps Rotolights should come with these little tripods.

The LEDs, being multiple point sources, give some interesting reflection effects. I am working with the gels at the moment for back lighting effects and getting some lovely backgrounds.

The Rotolights are probably not best used for big sets. The light they give off may be too gentle/diffuse over any distance to compete with bigger main lights. So in these cases they should be used as supplementary lights/creative lights and gentle fill-in.

Big powerful lights are often too much in small areas or for still life. Powerful lights are also difficult to set up / control in the home or small table top studios. So the Rotolight fills a very big gap in small scale lighting provision and this kit does it really well. I thought I was taking a chance on buying these lights but they were definitely a worthwhile, flexible addition to my lighting equipment.