Ultra Bright LED Circular Panel
Mediacentric comments and is wondering what's your experience with these Circular LED Video Light panels? They are available in 276 LEDs
Ultra Bright LED Circular Panel
I could be mistaken, but to warm these guys up (they are like Cloudy temp) you'd need a bit of CT orange Rosco E-Colour #223 1/8 CT Orange (21x24" Sheet)
Vimeo member Carl throws up a demo video with the Canon T2i on Hague MMC video stabilizer. Something i've shown a while so nothing new there. Jump on over to 2:18 in the video and you find out how Carl balances the GoPro and iPhone properly. I've always said if your camera is too light for the stabilizer, you need to add weight to the top. Carl achieves this by adding a small Manfrotto tripod which works well for weight and adds the function of a quick release adapter. Now that the GoPro has an LCD BacPac, we could start seeing more GoPro Flying. Watch out Tiffen Smoothee, the cheaper Hague MMC with some small mods can easily balance a Flip, GoPro, iPhone and more...[Thanks Carl]
Hague Mini-Motion Cam Video Stabilizer
Now Carl does an excellent job with the Hague MMC, but i've used this stabilizer before and there's other (better and cheaper) options. The Hague is higher priced than the IndieHardware which I reviewed against the Hague MMC not so long ago. You can definitely save a few clams if you considered the IndieHardware over the Hague for your lightweight cameras.
IndieHardware Camera Stabilizer
If you're really interested in flying a GoPro, you should also check out another version of these type of stabilizers from Lensse. Probably just as good if not better than the rest with a price that sits in between. There's also a smaller version offered by Lensse dedicated to small Cell Phones (iPhones) or PDA's. Right now Lensse is trying to grab some marketshare and some items are being auctioned off starting at .99 cents. These small stabilizers already designed to work with an iPhone without any further modification, just might be good enough for the GoPro too. A deal hard to pass up..
Matt writes in to share an LED light panel find via eBay. Normally you'd filter down to Video or Camera lighting, so you might have missed this one (I know I did). These are LED panels used as grow lights for indoor plants or aquarium accent lighting. This particular panel holds 225 LED's spaced out to cover a decent area. With 4 of these, you'd be working your way up to a 900 LED light source that is said to be rated at 5600K. Not too bad.
There's two versions that they sell, one being an 'upgraded' Ultrathin version. No specs on actual color temperature from that listing, but the ultrathin looks pretty nice. Since these aren't stamped under video or photo, they run extremely cheap. I just ordered one to test to see if it's a DIY start, but at worst case it'll be great for my Photo Cocoon lightbox or place it over my aquarium. Nice that they already come in a housing (looks like aluminum but most likely plastic). They are offered in a variety of mixed color LED's or just plain white. Make sure you check on the ones that specify 'white only' and you can find them below. [Thanks Matt]
About time I had my own Dry Erase slate a.k.a Clapper a.k.a ClapBoard. I ordered this 9 x 11 dry erase slate from Amazon
Cheapest of all the ones i've found is the very generic White 9 x 11 Director's Clapboard via Amazon (below).
Thanks to a tip from John - Twitter user @itsjohnny2, The long long awaited LCD BacPac from GoPro is now available and in stock. Not much to say here, but damn it's about time!
GoPro HD Cameras and Accessories
This is going to open up a few new doors to what you can do with the GoPro., but it does make that lens more prone to dust and scratches. Shouldn't be a huge deal for you non-sports GoPro users like Timelapse stuff or Steadicam Flying. Here's a video of Cinevate flying a GoPro on a custom stabilizer: https://vimeo.com/16013644. I bet they wished they had the LCD screen back then.
Whoa wait wait..I think they do have a rear casing to support the LCD BacPac into the water proof enclosure. Yup, it's all there. Now you can have your LCD underwater too.
GoPro HD Cameras and Accessories - GoPro.com
BTW, did you know some folks actually sell Polarized and ND filters for the GoPro? Makes sense, especially on super bright days found here: GoPro ND and Polarized Filters
What do you think about ikan's new 4 Bulb LED location light? It's a different take on LED lighting than traditional panels. Pretty clever to be able to swap bulbs not just for color temperature but also for beam angle. The ID-400 comes complete with remote, lighting unit and light stand adapter and one set of tungsten flood bulbs. The bulbs are interchangeable and can be changed easily in the field. Other bulbs including daylight, spot, daylight flood and tungsten spot are sold separately. Can also be powered through optional Battery mount.
It doesn't stop there. The bulbs can also be used with Ikan's new ILED-ONE. A custom hot shoe mounted LED bulb housing that allows you to replace the bulb from Daylight to Tungsten and beam angles from 40 to 60. Power pack is sold according to battery type you'll be using from Sony, Canon, and Panasonic.
YouTube member kellyhuffaker throws up a nice (and totally amusing) review of the budget crane I purchased a while back. I've used it only a few times, but didn't get around to sharing much. I like the idea of using the panning bearing (in this video) over a Fluid Head since it saves on cash. You'd need a very large head to support this kind of weight like a Manfrotto 501 or larger. Great job on this video, the tips, and the comedy. [Thanks Kelly]
What is a Teleprompter? In some situations, it could be a life saver. Especially when you're renting a location and time is limited. Teleprompters are extremely useful tools when you're working with a host or anyone that needs to read off lines while looking directly into the camera's lens. Most green screen shows like Tosh.0 or Talk Soup have these types of tools. Many ENG reporters are setup with prompters too. You might think that placing a sheet of paper close to the camera's lens would be just as effective, but try it and you'll see that little bit of offset is very noticeable. If you've ever had to wait on a host to memorize lines or had problems nailing a speech, you need to start looking into Teleprompters.
Teleprompters use a reflective angled mirror to display text from a screen while the camera is positioned behind this angled glass. The camera does not see the reflection and looks pretty much normal shooting through the beam splitter. To optimize the reflection, the entire rear panel needs to be covered and prevent any light from hitting the back of the angled reflector.
Here's a DIY teleprompter from Tompter.com. This version I have uses a bent sheet of heavy acrylic with a special tint film to act as the beam splitter. The one i'm showing is an unfinished version of the 'Tompter' and was sent to me to show me how effective this DIY setup is. The finished versions which can be purchased normally includes: Monitor, Stand, Acrylic Mirror & Bag assembly, and 10' VGA cable. That's pretty much everything you need to start shooting except for a laptop. All for not a bad deal (considering you get a monitor too). You can check out some other Teleprompters here at B&H. Free teleprompting software can be downloaded from various websites, all this information is at Tompter.com.
Acrylic itself may have many cons, mainly because it's not as scratch proof as glass and can collect dust. There are advantages to using acrylic though, and even the super high end Teleprompters which run thousands, sometimes provide the option of acrylic over glass for durability. If you're shooting in a war zone, acrylic might be the better type of material to carry around. The special beam splitting tint film on this Tompter is very effective even when the lights in the studio are on. Even when two 1000 watt lights are aimed at it's direction the text was still very readable. I did not notice any color shifts or much loss in exposure. Now the one I have here is an Acrylic based Prompter, but if you need Glass there's also a higher end Glass beam splitter available from Tompter too. By the way Tom is pretty open about making these and is working on a DIY video to share. If you have questions about making your own, you can contact Tom at for more information about Tompter below.
I'm going to finish this version up with a light stand mount and put this thing to use! To keep my iPad from falling out, I figure i'll just add some velcro to the back of this iPad Hard Shell Case.
DIY Teleprompter Kit w/ LCD Screen, Stand, Prompter - Tompter
NextWaveDV.com reviews the Linco Flora Fluorescent lights and puts them against some very expensive Kino's. (Hey, I get a shot out too!). Although not a true match against the Kino's, the Linco's seem to hold up very well through the tests. Looks like a solid design with a great output at a budget filmmaker price. Unlike cheaper FLO's, these Linco's seem to be more tolerant to higher shutter speeds with less banding. Keep in mind I believe they are testing at 1/1000ths shutter speed, which isn't something you'll be using with 'in studio' video.
ID 400 4-Lamp LED Light
