Subtronic LED Video Lights

Subtronic, maker of high end strobes, announced their new Video light at Boot in Dusseldorf. This new video light uses LED diodes laid in a 16:9 pattern and the beam covers 110° in the rectangular shape vs the traditional round shape. Most exciting of all is the CRI is claimed at 96, the highest available LED diode available. If these claims are true, the biggest stumbling block for LED has just been removed with the release of this product.

The lamp head is 500g(1.1lbs) and the Akkutank 7.2Ah LiMn (they use Li Mg (which is magnesium is approx 1kg (2.21 lbs). A dual head lamp and battery will weigh approx 2kg (4.42lbs). There is very little information from Subtronic (as usual) but if this is the same LED diode that produces 55lm/W then it should have over 2300 lumens per head (considering operational inefficiencies). This would make it the highest output LED video light announced.

It is also competitively priced as it costs €1407.56 (MSRP, no VAT) or just under US$2000 for 2 lamp heads, battery and charger.

Burn times are assumed to be 75mins for one head, 35 for 2 heads, power is variable from 1/4,1/2,3/4,full.

Fathom what you can from Subtronic's own website:

Subtronic Video Light

A bit of warning: from research in the WP archives, Subtronic does have the reputation of taking a long time for service of their products, especially for those outside of Germany. If their product does produce what is advertised, then hopefully their innovation also crosses over to their service dept.

Subtronic, maker of high end strobes, announced their new Video light at Boot in Dusseldorf. ...

So who will be first to come up with an arm system that allows us to have a couple of these babies plus a couple of Inon Z240s all rigged up together?

That's easily doable with tri clamps. I've already configured mine for the ViDSLR unit.

I think lighting manufacturers will come up with hybrid lamps to match ViDSLR once the market gains ground. With battery technology now, the high draw of high powered strobes can be matched with LED lamps, so it's a matter of time before they come, once the market grows enough.

Put a circular strobe tube around that LED light head and power it from the same battery source. The add a big, fat, strobe arm version of the battery. Subtronic could do that.

A 96 CRI is pretty impressive. It looks like the battery pack is 7.2V.

7.2V? Where did you see that? Or are you extrapolating from the confusion Subtronic calls data on their website? Everywhere I look the spec is 7.2Ah and no voltage. I'd assume with 42W it'd be 12v.

As for hybrid lights, a few manufacturers already have bright enough lights to work with video. The modeling lights of the bigger strobe systems are 20W halogen or more, which can work as video lights for night dives relatively well. The fat battery still has to be under the housing to maintain balance.

The 90+ CRI is claimed but the LED bulbs I've been sourcing for my home all are at higher voltage. So who knows how the CRI is affected once you go down to 12V or below. It's like the Lumens/Watt claims by LED. It's under optimized conditions and with higher power supply. From what I've been told (and I won't bother to verify), the efficiency of LED is pretty much around 55-65lm/w in reality.

(btw email me about tuesday morning, we will be spending Matt's money on breakfast!)

7.2V? Where did you see that? Or are you extrapolating from the confusion Subtronic calls data on their website? Everywhere I look the spec is 7.2Ah and no voltage. I'd assume with 42W it'd be 12v.

As for hybrid lights, a few manufacturers already have bright enough lights to work with video. The modeling lights of the bigger strobe systems are 20W halogen or more, which can work as video lights for night dives relatively well. The fat battery still has to be under the housing to maintain balance.

The 90+ CRI is claimed but the LED bulbs I've been sourcing for my home all are at higher voltage. So who knows how the CRI is affected once you go down to 12V or below. It's like the Lumens/Watt claims by LED. It's under optimized conditions and with higher power supply. From what I've been told (and I won't bother to verify), the efficiency of LED is pretty much around 55-65lm/w in reality.

 

(btw email me about tuesday morning, we will be spending Matt's money on breakfast!)

I'm doing a lot of extrapolating.

6 x 7W x75 minutes = 52.5 Wh

52.5 / 7.2 Ah = 7.3 V

Cell voltage for that technology is 3.7 V so either they are really efficient and the battery is 2-cell (7.4V) or it is 11V.

BTW, Drew, there is no email address for you and Wetpixel doesn't allow me to PM you. Need to exchange information on how to meet.

Yeah I came up with that after I posted. Still I don't know if the burn time is for 2 heads or 1. Subtronic's site isn't the greatest on data. I suppose it's also new and they may not have finalized specs yet.

Hartenberger has been using Li Mn for awhile and have batteries up to 14.4V.

If the battery is 7.2V then the efficiency is impressive. If the battery is 11V then the weight of the divable pack is impressive! I hope the product is as good as these specs say it is.

YES, this quite an IMPRESSIVE videolight!

Although, I'm a developer of a plug-compatible LED upgrade for Light & Motion Sunray halogen and HID systems (www.FTechX.com), I too find it difficult to draw good information with regard to specs, performance and actuality from marketing releases.

The Subtronic flyer, which is downloadable in German from their website, states that the battery capacity is 7.2 volts at 7.2 Ampere hours resulting in a total energy capacity of 52 watt-hours. The flyer also states that the LED is "6 x 7W" which suggests a total of 42 watts. The cited burntime of 75 minutes is consistent with the 52 watt-hour battery energy capacity BUT IGNORES THE REALISTIC INEFFICIENCY OF THE LED DRIVE CIRCUITRY. Thus either the actual power applied to the LEDs is less than 42 watts or the burntime is exagerrated.

7.2 volts would be the nominal voltage of 6 series connected 1.2volt NiMH cells. With a total of 18 AA sized NiMH cells, three strings of six in series, one could reasonably expect a 7.2Ah capacity.

By the way I was fascinated by the comments relating to ViDSLRs. Do you folks think there is a market for combination Strobes-Videolights?

Art

www.FTechX.com

By the way I was fascinated by the comments relating to ViDSLRs. Do you folks think there is a market for combination Strobes-Videolights?

www.FTechX.com

You bet, and it will grow as everyone gets used to the idea. Bit like the older question "will there be a market for UW housings for digital cameras?"

Art

A combo Strobe/Light would be awesome if done right. Right now the market for ViDSLR is young. If you start something now, you'd be ahead of everyone but you'd be pouring money into something that isn't a sure thing. I'd say do the engineering work and wait to do the prototype if you don't have the money to blow.

Thing is with strobes, there are many qualities desired. Wide even beam, good color temp, powerful, multistepped power control, TTL (e/i), fiber optic/slave TTL option. Take the Inon Z240's size, weight, TTL functionality and reliability and put in Subtronic's power, wide beam and color temp and you'll be popular with the DSLR crowd. Throw in a good variable power LED light (25% for spot light, 100% video, interchangeble reflector for spot and flood. With a diffuser dome, the wide beam can cover both and then just leave a little clear spot for the spotter light All using Li Mn or Li Fe batteries to keep it small as possibly.

The 7.2V 7.2AH battery the subtronic is using are Li Mn (or Li Mg) not NiMH. I doubt you can get 7.2AH 7.2V in a package that small with NiMH. Your PCB would also have to prevent overdraw of power by shutting down the LED when the flash goes off. I'm not sure if Li Mn can handle the drawn of a 150Ws strobe with LED. Then there's the heat consideration since LED produces heat like Halogen but all that is kept inside the lamphead.