Lighting and accessories manufacturer Harlowe has introduced three new photo/video lights to its Max Spectra range. The three heads are rated at 40W, 80W and 120W and use Red, Green, Blue, Cool White and White LEDs to create what the company claims is a range 36,000 colours. One of the unique features of these Harlowe Max Spectra lights, according to Harlowe, is that brightness doesn’t alter when switching from white light, for example, to a fully saturated red light. The company claims the lights run at full power whichever LEDs are in use, so if you set your exposure using 3200K it will remain the same should you shift the colour of the light to pure green. The designers have achieved this by allowing each of the colour channels their own power allocation rather than spreading all the power across all of the channels, so the coloured LEDs aren’t dimmer than the white ones.
Given that the expected brightness of each light is 2500lm, 5800lm and 8700lm it may be the case that the white LEDs are somewhat restricted to meet the power of the colours. It isn’t unusual in the full colour light to have a ‘constant brightness’ mode that brings the power of the brighter LEDs down to match the darker ones – so that colour changes don’t alter exposure.
These Harlowe Max Spectra heads each has a wide colour temperature range of 1700-10,000K, and the company claims CRI/TLCI figures of 96. The heads can be powered via a mains adapter, and those who work most often on location can take advantage of the 6900mAh internal battery. Harlowe says the battery will run the lights at 100% power from between 2hr 18mins and 40min, depending on the model. Each head contains a cooling fan that runs at 22dB, and the heads can be controlled via Bluetooth from a smartphone.
The 40W head comes with a 4.5x zoom lens feature that can narrow the beam of light while also increasing the brightness at the subject. The 80W and 120W heads use Harlowe’s Lumina Intensifier Lens to do a similar job. The heads have a proprietary mounting system for modifiers, and are compatible will all the existing softboxes etc.
The Harlowe Max Spectra heads cost £645.20 for the 40W kit, £835.18 for the 80W kit and £911.18 for the 120W kit. A prism-like Magic Lens that creates a dappled, ripple effect, adds £76 to any of the kits.
For more information see the Harlowe website.