Small LED Light Panel Showdown

http://www.learningdslrvideo.com/150-led-light-panels/

I have really been in the need to a small 150 LED light that I can take anywhere. So I decided to compare 2 different brands one expensive and one inexpensive.

These lights have so many uses, I even used one of them to fix my kitchen sink. I am not so much interested in using this as a key light, I am not interested in using it for accent lights, hair light for 3/4 back fill light, you name it, they have a ton of uses.

In testing the two, I have found a clear winner. Konova Ledgo CN-B150 vs. Lite Panel MicroPro.
Construction

Both are equal in regards to construction, both are made out of light weight plastic and wouldn't survive a 4 foot drop on concrete. In fact I am not sure either of them would last a few years of constant use before breaking.

For instance here is a review from someone line that had been using it for while: ...but it's cheaply made plastic. I have to tape the base because it bent and you can't buy replacement parts.

I was kind of expecting a metal case from the Lite Panel because of the huge price difference and the pro in the name. To me if you put pro on something it needs to take the abuse. The Lite Panel is $390 and the Konova is only $130.

When unboxing the Lite Panel I noticed this warning note saying if I installed the batteries wrong and kill that it is my fault, I was kind of taken back when I read this because this is a sure sign that the circuit design is not well thought out and has no fault protection built in.

The next thing that really disappointed me about the Lite Panel was the light level control. As you can see the first half the travel on the potentiometer does absolutely nothing and all the action occurs in the last quarter turn, this is not the case with the Konova. If I didn't know better the person designing the circuitry for this biff this one, and is totally using the wrong type of potentiometer. My guess is they are using a logarithmic pot instead of a linear one.

I kinda light the Lite Panel mount on the Lite Panel better than the Konova.
Light Output

In my tests the Konova Ledgo CN-B150 is slightly brighter than the Lite Panel and is more directional in terms of the light pattern.
Quality of Light

Since both do not publish their CRI number I emailed each manufacturer. Konova told me that is at 80 CRI. Michele over at Lite Panels told me the CRI for there panel is approx 85%. I am not sure why Michelle gave me the CRI number as a percentage.

In my test I could not tell the difference between the two lights in terms of how they reproduce the colors, however up against a halogen with a CRI of 100 I could see some difference, but it was not much.
Battery Life

The Lite Panel fails again on it circuitry design, when each battery falls below 1.2 volts the panel starts to flicker. The Konova does not do this at all when when it drops below this voltage. I thought Lite Panels were the leader for all this LED technology, why is this thing so poorly designed?

The Konova has a nice battery tester while the Lite Panel does not.
Gels

I have very little experience with gels, I am not even sure what CTO or CTB means. Perhaps color temp orange or blue?

In this first test I set my T2i to it's generic Daylight white balance setting and as you can see here Konova has a green bias compared to the Lite Panel, perhaps the Konova is using cheaper LED's that are more efficent in the green specrum light, similar to florscents are.

Next I put in their orange gels and I set the white balance to the generic tungston setting. Looks like the Konova loses here with even more green tint.

Since the Lite Panel has to CTO gels I used the lighter one here.

I am not sure this matters to much since the gels themselves might be the issue and not the light since I can buy better gels for the Konova.
Banding

The last test I did was to look for banding issues like you get with florescent lights but I went all the way from 30th to 800th of a second on the shutter and did not see any banding for either light which is good.
Conclusion

Give the cheap construction of these lights that might only last for a few years before breaking so for me the clear winner is the Konova, the Lite Panel has too many issues and comes in at an insane price.

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Products Used In This Video

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http://konovaphoto.com/index.php/affiliate/index/listCategories/program_id/3/...

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/616394-REG/Litepanels_LP_MICROPRO_Micro...

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[amarmitra]

Banding? You mean flicker.

[drumat5280]

@amarmitra no, banding to me looks a lot different.

[hpcine]

Outstanding, but on all these video, please reduce the background music! It definitely interferes. Great videos, thanks for sharing great information!

[drumat5280]

@hpcine thanks for the suggestion, I will turn it down next time.

[nul10productie]

Thanks for the test. Please turn off the background music.

[drumat5280]

@nul10productie I will lower it next time.

[hobocamptheater]

I hate green cast but I definitely would hate voiding warranty by placing the batteries improperly much much more.

[thingsdemystified]

@willwetmoreable I didn't know it was illegal for males to laugh, or maybe you're not from around here. In the US, it's ok for anybody to laugh. It's called being friendly. Nice people do it from time to time. You should try it.

[willwetmoreable]

why did you laugh at the begining? is it because your a r gay?

[lifeartpixels]

@drumat5280 you always make such informative videos, it's great thanks for posting dude

[heymrrayray]

That was sad to see that the suppose led leader failed. Do you think you can do a review on the litepanel ring light?

[aidemmediasolutions]

Nice Review Doug the LitePanels are a bit disappointing in this - I bought a Flo-light 500w LED, and I was planning on doing one of these vs the cheaper "fancier" brand LED I'll send you a message when it is up. I couldn't see myself coughing up a few thousand for some LED lighting... I only use it in the summer when it is too hot to use Tungsten

[vancian1970]

Someone please tell me how Litepanels stays in business. I unfortunately own to LP micro's and they are sitting in a box in my closet unused since the z96 came out.