Just bought myself two very similar lights off eBay for AUD 305 plus two cacoons and a scrim!

In the end they're all much the same, only thing you'll find on some of the more expensive units is a dimmer rather than bank switches. If you can, add egg crates to the kit. These kinds of lights spill light and the reflective barn doors spill light more as you close them. Some have reversable barn doors, silver on one side, matte black on the other. If you want to soften them down a bit clip some spun across the barn doors, good thing about having so little heat, nothing is too likely to catch fire. Also keep in mind you can get the tubes in tungsten and daylight, an Osram dealer can get you either. Just ask for Studioline 55W tubes.

Bob.

Thanks Bob and John. Sounds like a "go." Good to know about the replacement tubes, too.

Jack

I've been using a similar "Fokon" Chinese-made unit for 4 days on a hotel promo shoot. I really like it. I can switch on either the inner 2 bulbs, the outer 2 bulbs, or all 4. It's really quite powerful with all 4 on and makes a good fill light with big bright windows supplying the key light. Or to reinforce light supplied by a window. If you can stretch to a 4-bulb unit or even 6 then perhaps get that?

Mine came with a fabric diffuser which hooks onto the side barn doors. But even without the diffuser the light is pretty soft because it's so spread out. And heat has been no problem at all. They're quite handleable even after being on for a long time.

The barn door on mine are polished aluminium finish which can't be reversed or peeled off. I'm thinking of spraying them matt black.

Biggest problem is carrying the thing around. Mine isn't strong enough on it's own to withstand knocks. Perhaps the original Kino Flo units are tougher. We've been having to use a big suitcase as a stop-gap. I'm getting a wetsuit shop to make me a 7mm neoprene case for the head, with handle and shoulder strap, and I'm intending to make a case for the stand out of plastic drainpipe with screw-on end.

Perhaps the original Kino Flo units are tougher.

Yes. In particular their Diva Lites that are designed for portable use. Not indestructible, but close for any normal use.

Even the tubes (which are available in Daylight, Tungsten, Bluescreen Blue, and Greenscreen Green) are more rugged.

check out www.coollights.biz as well - Richard Andrewski has built some fluoro lights that are absolutely awesome - much higher quality than most of Kino knockoffs too -

I'm not saying flolights aren't decent for the money, but considering they're selling a $5 chinese tent light as a $150 camera ringlight, I have to be wary about their business practices now.

cheno

I've been following coollights for some time. I'm not too certain about his fluro lights and the use of polycarbonate sheet as a material. Even in the photos on his site you can see it's bending from the load where the mounting attaches.

Kino Flos are generally great lights, we've got a Kino 800 and it does provide wonderous light but it's damn expensive to buy, own and transport. The fluro tubes are pushed to 100W and get very hot for a fluro tube and don't last too long. At around $500 for a set it can become an expensive light to use.

Lowel Caselights, used to love them until we found a serious design flaw. The cases break all too easily. The plastic material is very rigid and provide no shock protection for the contents and is heavy. But the real problem is the aluminium extrusion used on the lip of the case. It's cut to form the corners and a small knock and it breaks. They're probably OK if you own them and move them in your own vehicle but not the thing for air travel or letting someone else bang around.

One thing to really watch out for with any lights and this will vary from country to country is meeting safety standards. Down here if it's "professional", you can kind of get away with anything, almost, until something goes wrong. That's also why you see a lot of stuff sold on eBay and the like without a main lead. No lead, it isn't an appliance. You fit the lead and then any safety issues are yours to worry about.

Bob.

Regarding their "$5 tent lights" for $150. Since I was the one that made the statement about them being the exact same thing, I checked into it. Yes, they are essentially the same as the tent lights mechanically, but they have manually replaced all 48 LEDs with much higher quality, matched LEDs which justifies the higher cost. Given that, I don't think that $150 is unreasonable.

John