David J Frederick, SOC
An opportunity was presented to me to get a few lighting units to test and use during two different productions recently and I will say that I am impressed with the versatility, the subtleness and the power of the Litepanels Gemini LED 2×1’ Soft lights.
The over whelming aspect of these lights is that they are a mighty powerful lamp in a modest sized, affordably priced and fairly lightweight package with the ability to serve my photography is several different manners of operation. From their low amperage AC power draw enabling them to easily be used on location in a wall outlet, working off of an attached industry standard Anton Bauer battery and also way up on a stage grid attached to a computer cue DMX system!
I have been working with the Litepanels company products since their beginnings as an early adopter of the Mini Lite Panels, the Micro Litepanels, the earliest 1×1’ Litepanels, the Mini Ring light. I helped out on a promo shoot and did their Steadicam demo footage and testimonial of the beautiful design of that unit.
Now I am pleased to applaud this accomplishment in bringing this welcome affordable addition to the Cinematographer’s lighting tool box, the Gemini series of LED Soft lighting systems. In my recent experience working with these Gemini lights I discovered that they are indeed many things to all people, inasmuch as they satisfy many of the requirements of lighting our subjects in every filmic situation with ease, both subtle and powerful output with the added ability to supply high CRI levels and a beautiful palette of filming colors, effects and industry known presets.
My use was on documentary and narrative filming projects. The quick set up, CC presets, handy “speed or subtle” dimming knob, dependable clean output and ease of AC or battery power with attached gold mount plates and batteries, made these a go-to and beautifully effective tool for our documentary interviews and set up in the project I was enlisted to shoot this fall. Responsible for making very famous legendary faces and distinguished speakers look good with an artful appearance was quick and easy with the Gemini units. Quick set up, execution and wrap outs was the name of the game for me and I was so happy to expand upon the standard LED “look” with these beautiful new units that made my images look natural and have just the right amount of “portrait pop” I was looking for. There were zero misgivings in unwanted color shifts, intensity fluctuations and the light the units gave off was clean and pure. When color effects or lighting effects were desired I could dial them in, enjoying the presets for a variety of flicker/color effects such as fire, TV, police or emergency light simulations. Really a great deal of incredible output power, subtlety and nuanced color shading and simple preset settings for nearly every imaginable lighting situation in one robust yet compact unit at a very reasonable price point!
The narrative efforts were equally as satisfying. My team and I were able to accomplish huge page counts in a variety of locations with minimal muss and fuss achieving a large lighting package look with only a few of these Gemini units. I was involved with the crewing and equipment provisions for a short narrative film, “Amy’s Gift” this past month and my associate Directors of Photography, Dianne Farrington, SOC and Bry Thomas Sanders, SOC had their first experiences with the Gemini LED 1×2’ Soft lights.
Here are some of the comments from Co-DP and Camera Operator, Bry Sanders, SOC:
“Recently, I had the pleasure of working with several of the new Litepanel Gemini 2×1 LED Soft panels for our film, “Amy’s Gift.” They proved their worth in many ways. I found them to produce a very pleasing quality of light while proving to be extremely versatile and practical. Considering their low power consumption, I was impressed with the unit’s light output which was more than sufficient to create satisfying ambient bounce light for intimate night and punchy enough create satisfying directional key light even at very low output. I also found they worked very well as fill light for daylight scenes, supplementing and filling with a uniform, soft quality and easily adjustable color temperature. The color correction presets proved essential for quickly ball-parking our color temperature corrections, while the fine adjustment dial was helpful in making quick adjustments on the fly. Had we been a longer shoot, I would have built custom WB presets and the fact that the Geminis have programable buttons for this purpose was intriguing to me. This short narrative film, “Amy’s Gift” called for some slow-motion shots and the Geminis were a great option for this. Quickly adjustable output-wise, I never detected any flicker or color shift. With their size and onboard ballast construction, they were easy to rig and power- primarily utilizing house power and although we didn’t have need for the built in effects, I’m interested to see how they perform on future projects. All said, I was impressed with the new Gemini Litepanel and look forward to utilizing them on future projects.”
Dianne Farrington, SOC, also DP on “Amy’s Gift,” submits her impression: ”On a recent project I discovered the versatility of the Litepanel Gemini 2×1 LED Soft lights. After using tungsten lights in the past the Gemini units provided an amazing flexibility in comparison. Considering the instruments low mass to output ratio and built-in power supply the lamps were fast and easy to set. 2 Gemini units were used on a set that had a large scenic window as a background source. We easily toggled through the Gemini settings to match the color temperature of the natural window light, one lamp was enough to provide nice background kick and the needed background separation while the other provided a beautiful soft fill for the actress. The Litepanel Gemini 2×1 LED Soft lights are powerful, compact, have variable programmable color temperature, and a precisely dimmable light source. These are all functions that make it a considerably great asset for this and future projects.”
Bry Thomas Sanders, SOC with Litepanels Gemini 2 x 1 Soft light on location in Venice, CA Art studio short film “Amy’s Gift” shoot.
Director Drew Rosenberg pointing and DP Dianne Farrington, SOC with the Gemini 2×1 LED Soft on the set of “Amy’s Gift”
Bry Thomas Sanders, SOC, making adjustments of the Lightpanel Gemini 2×1 LED Soft on the set of “Amy’s Gift”
The Litepanel Gemini 2×1 LED Soft on the interview set of a documentary shot by David J. Frederick, SOC. The film title is under wraps at the moment…
