After my last post, I got to thinking again about lighting.
I have plenty of light, but it is a bit of a mess to apply.
I can punch 300w+ through a mod, but it takes 3-4 lights to do it and they need power.
I can be portable and wall power free, the kit is;
Amaran 60d
Weeylite RB9
A couple of little tubes and panels
A pair of Manfrotto Nano stands and some Neewer super lite ones.
This all fits in a small 40L suit case with a Smallrig soft box and other bits.
Neat.
A little limited.
The Amaran is the 60d (for daylight), the RB9 is RGB, but not as powerful and only two real lights does limit my options. The Amaran can run off NP batts, which I have plenty of, but they are also doing other things, the RB9 has good life and decent power and it can be powered off a power bank (which it also is).
So, what if I wanted to add some decent power to the kit, not add much in the way of extra stuff and do not want to spend a ton on another light?
The Smallrig RC 60b (bi-colour), has an internal battery, is bi-colour, can run off a PB, is cheap compared to others ($210au for the lite-no frills kit) and tiny. It is about the same size as the bare Amaran, but needs nothing but itself.
It is not perfect, needing proprietary mods and there only two, a small diffuser in the box and a small and over priced soft box. It has no app, something I rarely bother with, but if stuck above the shoot on a tall stand or boom, it would be a major pain to adjust on the fly.
These concerns are probably not a big deal really, as the Amaran does everything it does not and there are ways. Because it does not ironically fit the Smallrig lantern or softbox I have, it would probably not be the overhead light anyway.
The mod thing is something I would have dealt with easily anyway, running it into a or through a brolly, reflector, diffuser or a combination. Small soft boxes are not appealing for good light quality, so I would have never likely used it.
Light colour being limited on the Amaran to daylight is something I was ok with from the get-go and it got me a cheaper, brighter light than the 60x. It meant I can shoot the whole scene with adjusted white balance based on the slightly stronger main light, then re-adjust background light with the RB9 etc.
The Smallrig light though would allow me to either replace the daylight light with a bi-colour from the start, handy if the background is massive like the outdoors, the Amaran can then be gelled to warm or cool as needed as a second source or just to mimic daylight.
Lastly, but not a small thing, if I need more punch, say 120w of punch, I have it with the two combined without having to run power to larger COB lights.
With several NP970 batts, and several power banks, it would not be unreasonable to expect 2-4 hours out of these lights.
Ordered.