Is this like, Cool? Yes, it is. And it’s also warm. It’s a bi-color light, focusing bi-color light from Intellytech. Let’s take a look at it.
This review is sponsored by Intellytech. But, I only agreed to do it after I used the light for a month. And I thought, “You know what, it’s worth doing.” I haven’t done a review of a light in a long, long time. But this light kind of hits a sweet spot that I think is worth talking about.
Today on The Slanted Lens we’re going to take a look at Intellytech’s new light, the X-100 Light Cannon. It’s a great light for several different reasons. One, it’s a bi-color light. So you got everything from 2800 degrees to 6500 degrees. And it retains the light quality, high CRI entirely through that range. So that’s the first thing. Secondly, it’s a chip onboard (a COB), which gives you a single source LED, which is fabulous for a couple of reasons, and really where I think the lighting industry has already headed, and where it’s going to go in full force in the coming days. That is because you can put a Bowens mount on the front of that single chip, and you can modify it so easily. So you have to bi-color light, with a single LED source with a Bowens mount on the front. And then with this light, you add the fact that you can change the beam angle from a 15 degree to a 70 degree beam angle. That makes this light into several different lights on set. The first is you can put this on that really narrow beam angle of 15 degrees and set in the background, and it’s a great rim light. And we’ve been using it as a rim light often in that situation. It gives us the ability to put it in the background, rim the person and not throw light all over the set, and change the look and the dramatic light on the person’s face. One of my favorite ways to work with a light like this is to be able to use it with a reflector. And the reason I love reflectors is because I like to use grids. These grids go in this reflector, and they cut down the area of coverage. But they also cut down the intensity of the light, sometimes by a stop and sometimes as much as two stops. The nice thing about this light is that I can focus it, by just simply turning the collar. I can get up to 70 degree coverage down to 15 degree coverage. And I can use it with this reflector or I take this reflector off, which lets it be a little more broad. And it changes the area of coverage. You don’t need all these grids. It’s just easy to modify. You can put a softbox on it. And that’s going to allow you to give a nice soft light. Or, one of my favorites is a beauty dish. I absolutely love a beauty dish. But on a beauty dish with this light, if you put this on the 15 degree beam angle, it hits the insert inside the beauty dish and it increases the intensity of the light. So first off, it’s brighter, because when you go to 15 degrees, it’s going to get brighter. And when you go to 70 degrees, it’s going to be a little more dim. But at 15 degrees, hitting this insert in the beauty dish, it bounces light through this entire dish and gives you a slightly harder look on the person’s face. You might think to yourself, “Why would you want the light harder?” The reason is because it gives a specular highlight on the face that looks fabulous. But you can really flood that out to 70 degrees in that beauty dish and give you a little softer light as well. If you have perfect skin a little bit harder, looks really great. So if you have not great skin, then you’ll want a little softer light. But you have that option because you can change that beam angle. You can also do a thing that Andy and I do a lot together. Andy loves that warm light in the background. This gives you the ability to mix different light colors. We can put this on 3200 or even warmer. And you can really give yourself a nice depth in the background with that warm light. So it gives you the ability on set to be able to change into tungsten or daylight and to change that color value as well. It gives a nice look on set that looks like a lamp in the background and gives you an interesting look.
Let’s talk about the build quality of this light. This is a very durable, thick aluminum body on this light. You could smash this thing with a sledgehammer. Okay, maybe you shouldn’t do that. But it has a great build quality. It’s not a thin aluminum. It’s going to give you years of use. It’s made to be a light that’s going to last and be able to stand the rigors of being on a professional set. That’s really what this feels like, to me, a light that’s made for professional use. So the market has been struggling with this little device right here, the control box. And Intellytech has really solved, for me, what was the biggest issue with these on other lights that are in the market. They have made it so you have a single source that goes off to AC power and you have a single cord that goes to your light. And now everything’s built into this one device. I’ve got the ability to dim and change my color balance here. I also have the ability to, if I need to, I can throw an Anton Bauer battery or a V mount battery on the back of this and with just a simple switch I can go from AC power to battery power. So it’s really easy to switch back and forth. This is all in one control box which makes this absolutely so much easier to use on set, without several different cords and two different devices you had to glue together or wrap together on some of our other lights. This just solves all of those issues and makes it very easy to be able to use this from one simple device.
Going outside is not the only time you want to use this on battery. We were just shooting in a dentist’s office last week. And it works really seamlessly to put this on a stand with the controller on a battery. Now we don’t have to find outlets and we don’t have drag a cable around the dentist’s office in those tight spaces. We just placed our light where we wanted to go. And we could run a gun and use it. It’s just a great way to use it. So we use these things on battery all the time.
This unit that contains our AC and our power controls, and also our battery plate is also made out of great aluminum. It’s made to be durable on set. And it feels like it’s going to be a great companion to this light. Because if this control box fails, the light is not going to do anything. I do like the fact that it has a short cable that comes with this light. So you don’t have to have a long cable between light and control box. But they also have an extension if you want to extend that higher and be able to get this thing up as high as you want to. It’s got a remote if you want to be able to run it off from the remote, which when you get several lights on set like this, it’s actually a great way to work. You’ll see gaffer’s dimming and changing the value of lights. And especially when you’re working by yourself and you have a light in the background, it just makes it very easy for you to be able to control that light and raise the value up and down and the intensity up and down. And it allows you to be able to change the color all that from this little remote.
So this light comes with a great little carrying case. Everything we see here is included, including the reflector. You do have to purchase the remote separately. So it has a great case to put everything together and haul it with you, including an extension cable. So Intellytech has equipped this light with a great fan. It’s very quiet. It runs quiet so you don’t pick it up on your sound. There’s no issue with that whatsoever. A lot of lights this small have a problem with a fan that is a little bit noisy. And that’s always been an issue. With this one we don’t hear that at all. It’s made to be on set and it’s not an audio or an overheating issue at all.
So the Light Cannon X-100 comes with nine different lighting effects. The ones that I’ve used the most are the television effect. I use that all the time. I’ll put a light up in front of a model on a chair or on a couch. And you get that flickering light. The other one I use is fireplace. I put lights in the fireplace to create a fireplace effect all the time. So it has a fireplace, candle and there’s several others there. It just depends on what you’re doing and how useful it’s going to be to you. But there are nine different effects with this light, and that’s always a great addition.
We can’t talk about lights like this unless we talk about intensity. So we did our eight 800 tests. So at eight feet at 800 ISO I took a meter reading. I got f/5.6 when it’s flooded. When I put it on spot at 15 degrees, I got an f/8.3. I absolutely love the Aputure lights, and we use them here all the time. But this is interesting because it sets itself where on flood, it’s kind of like a 120 D but on spot it’s closer to a 300 D, the first generation on both those lights. For me an on set kit would be to have a 300 D second generation. And I would have two of these because now I’ve got a light that is a little more powerful. But I’ve got some versatility with this as a rim light or as a soft fill light or as a background light. It just gives you so much versatility. I think that’s a pretty great kit if you’re doing an interview kit. That’s the kit I would put together.
So let’s wrap this up. Who is this light made for? It’s really professionally built. It’s a lightweight, small form factor, easy to set up bi-color light. You’ve got great build quality. So it’s going to last forever. It has great intensity. I feel like it fits nicely into the market and into most people’s kits. Every single one of the guys who work with me have said these lights are fabulous. And they want to get one of them because the price point is excellent. And the intensity is great. And the versatility with being able to focus it and flood it gives you so many different options. It’s a key light, it’s a rim light and it’s a light in the background. It just gives you all those things. That bi-color is super important because you can have a little bit of depth with a little bit of warm light. Or you can balance it to the tungsten lights in the room if you’re doing an interview. So if you have one of these lights post in the comments what you like about it. Tell us how it’s working for you. I’d love to hear it. So leave us a comment on our YouTube Channel. Subscribe to The Slanted Lens and keep those cameras rollin’ and keep on clickin’.
Let’s take a look at my own travel kit and that SKB 1309 case.
