I was definitely curious about how the VL vs Knowled version would compare. I know the VL's auto fan was something I didn't like but very interesting that the VL is more quiet!
Thanks for the comparison, Heather. The VL 300's were on a sale a few months back for only $399. Glad I bought one then because they are back up to $749 on the two major photography retailers out of New York / New Jersey area, as well as that little ecommerce site run by Jeff Bezos. Regarding the handle / yoke on the VL300, to me, it looks like you have to basically rotate the light so it is upside-down so that the weight of a softbox or heavy front accessory will actually be pulling toward TIGHTENING the yoke. (Then again, I could be wrong... no one has ever accuesed me of overthinking a problem.)
@@FellowFilmmaker all good over here. Can't complain. Thank you for the information on these lights. I appreciate them and I know I should check in on your reviews before buying. You're super! 🌹🌹🌹🌹
Just came across your channel a few days ago and your content and style is the best. Love the honest reviews that are so hard to come by on TH-cam. I was wondering if you have any plans to review 2 lights. The Nanlite Forza 300B II Bicolor is one. It looks like a huge upgrade ove the previous generarion and closer to Aputure quality. The second light is from a cheaper brand, and I feel ridiculous mentioning it. But GVM releases a pro series tomorrow. Specifically the GVM-PRO-SD400B. It's priced higher then their older series that was plastic. It actually looks like these might be a little more solid. I'm not suggesting one of the lower powered lights because they dont include the control box or battery power options. Anyway, great material and presentation. I plan on getting your course soon. I usually shoot Real Estate, but my girlfriend wanted to revamp her candle website and wanted a video. So I rented a Macro lens, Probe Lens, and the Aputure ls 300x with a softbox and ended up having a blast. Now I'm in the market to buy a light and that lead me to your channel. Look forward to more great content.
Glad you're enjoying the channel and learning things! :D I don't have plans at the moment to review those lights in particular. As I'm sure you imagine there are alot of lights out there and many folks have different ones that interest them. But I'll keep them in mind :D
Great honest video. I have the VL300 and it suffers from quality control issues. I own several Godox lights yet the VL300 is my most expensive and the only one to have problems. The v-mount battery power no longer works( main reason I bought it) after only a few months. I've seen many complaints of this light failing to power on, fan issues, etc. Wish I knew that before purchasing it.
If my main reason for getting a light, it to use a fresnel w/ it, which one (or brand) would you recommend? Aperture? Godox? Something else? My purpose for using it is to have a way to send some soft/diffused light to light up something like a plant in the background.
I've only got the Aputure and Godox ones. But generally speaking each brand tends to only work with their lights, since each chip is located at a different distance on each light.
@@FellowFilmmaker Haha, well, I was planning on getting the VL300 to match with my VL150, but now I'm not so sure. Then again, I tend to overthink every purchase beyond whats healthy ;)
Nice video Heather!. As a VL300 owner, I have to agree about the control box, although it's just a minor issue for me, not a big deal at all. When it comes to the yoke, I haven't had any issues when using a Light Dome 2 (gel holder included) or the projection mount, so, I guess, unless you're using 150cm domes, you should be fine. Anyway, the VL300 was a great purchase for me, specially since I got it 40% off retail for a black Friday-like event last year here in Chile. I'm sad to hear about the noise issues in the new one!!
Great tutorial, I have question regard the knowled m300d with the v mount battery can I use it to compensate with the sunlight I want to backlight my subject with the sun and I light my subject with m300d , here is my question will the subject illumination equal with the background lit by the sun
TBH I still would love to see Aputure make an 300W version of LS 600c Pro, which could use Mini-LEDs given the lower wattage. The Fresnel 2X, Space Light and Lantern accessories could also come in the kit, still with support for accessories that satisify the 600c Pro.
I got a rare request to video a few speeches for a book release party in a large ballroom. Pretty much none of the lights I own (mostly for interviews, basically softboxes with some LED bulbs inside) will work well. I have a limited budget for the shoot, but would prefer to buy (but could rent) a light. Any recommendations on something I could put closer to the back of the room and focus on the speakers that would still create a good video light?
I think in that type of case, if you aren't going with softboxes since they will be ineffective in a large ballroom, you'll want to go with fresnels or spotlight attachments on 300-600w lights. To but those outright if you don't own them will get costly. Not to mention the look you get is more of a showhost look. If you wanted to have lights that are more soft and tv broadcast studio look, then you'll go with panel lights mounted close to the talent (within 10ft) and above them if the ceiling is low enough (if not then it might not be worth the effort of ceiling mounting, which btw has more risk of falling on someone so be sure you have insurance and liability insurance). So safest bet is spotlight attachments, in my opinion, as they are more versatile and controllable as well as a natural brightener to the lights you are using. I have a video on spotlight mounts and light modifiers if you want to learn about them. Also, I recommend Aputure for best quality of light. Godox if you need to save a few bucks.
Great review - as usual! I don‘t like fan noise, so the M300d is probably not for me, unless I would only want to use it at 25% max power. However, other lights might be better in this respect.
Hello Heather. Top notch comparison as usual. I noticed at 3:28, when you are talking about the yoke's inability to hold heavy modifiers, that there is some kind of disc between the two halves of where you secure the yoke in position, and it seems that disc would interfere with the meshing of the teeth on each half. Have you tried removing that disc and tightening the yoke without it? It also seems strange that Godox would put noisier fans on the new light. From what I have seen of light reviews over the years it seems the majority of the video community is concerned with fan noise. I know I am.
@@FellowFilmmaker - I would guess they put that disc in there to reduce the teeth engagement while making adjustments, but instead it appears to be just an obstruction to the teeth. Give it a try (This is the Journeyman Toolmaker part of me coming out).
interesting... I was about to get the vl300 a few months ago because it had an amazing sale on b&h, but a in the reviews on the site people said it stops working in a few months, :/. Have you had any reliability issues with the 300? I haven't with the vl150.
Thanks for the review, Please I have some questions for you to make my investment decision. If M300Bi is £948, and M600D is £942 will you trade off Bi for power or will you invest in M600Bi of £1574.00 over M600D of £942.00. And, with your experience, what do you think the fans on both, are they too loud for interveiw set ups. I owned couple of Godox UL due to fan. Thanks
So, with bi color you will always lose a bit of brightness, it's just how it is. Unless you are trying to compete with direct sunlight often you can use the bi-color, I think it's great and useful. And yes, bi-color will always cost more since there is more going on in the light than just daylight only. I think the fans are reasonable, they are a bit "noisy" in pitch quality, but if you don't have mics within 3ft of them you'll likely be fine.
@@sahidsanusi2653 Davinci Resolve will cut the fun noise, and if you do not have Davinci Resolve, there are other Ai solutions that will remove any noise and keep human speech, etc. Noise fan should not be something we care in 2023 and going forward with the Ai innovations
I have adorama affiliate links on my smoke machine video if youd like to use them. Or if there is a specific one youd like ill get it for you I also have b and h as well 😁
I've not used the small rig so I can't say for sure But the UL60 is great if you want utter silence on set. I use it as my keylight in my current TH-cam setup :D
@@FellowFilmmaker it’s a 10x10 room but double as a storage space lol I have a desk set up and wanted to mount the ul60 on the ceiling or wall. Do you believe the Ul60 is bright enough for one person? The Vl150 was on sale also and they weren’t too far apart in pricing.
UL60 is perfect for one person :D I do it all the time And mounting from the ceiling would certainly save on space! Are you going to use varipoles overhead or just screw into the ceiling?
The yoke does suck if your into large parabolic’s & the control box is a bit big! That said I’ve been using the VL for over a year now and it’s a good light. Much cheaper than Aputure and the results are certainly comparable. Don’t think I will be running out for this updated version thou. I think I would take quieter fans over the box and the yoke update for now. Nice review thou!
@@FellowFilmmaker I use only led-panels, and sometime wonder should I need that "traditional" kind of light or not. It might have more power, operating distance, targeting.., maybe to use with softbox? With led panel I don't use softbox and that is something what I would like to try.
The benefit to a COB light is that it is a hard light that you can turn into a soft light if you want, or keep it a hard light and do a lot of lighting effects with. So with a hard light you can use a spotlight modifier for instance to shape the light into certain patterns or only hit certain parts of a scene or object. An panel light is hard to control but can still be great for lighting large areas or creating even lighting.
@@tapiorinne I use LED panels a lot (they have no fans and thus no noise), but as Heather suggests there is light spill everywhere (which is ok in my setting). If all you are looking for is soft light and you‘re fine with having the light all over the place, panels can do the job. I run my panel through the translucent layer of a 5-in-1 reflector with the LED panel mounted at a good distance behind it, resulting basically in a soft light source with a diameter of 120cm. However, as I said, that light bounces all around my room, so I cant have background illumination which is as nice as Heather‘s. You can use cardboard or foam boards to keep the light from going everywhere, but I guess it would be simpler to use directional lighting to achieve the same (or better) results.
Best to avoid the Godox VL300. Used mine once a month ago then it stayed in the case... tested it the night before a shoot a couple weeks ago and it malfunctioned. The fans wouldn't turn on until it overheated, fans came on, light went off... cooled off, light came on... this would happen every 60 seconds or so. There's lots of posts and videos online where others are having the same problem. I got hold of B&H and it's since been sent back, money refunded.
I think they're both look like two different brand of light and Godox just slap their brand on it. so it was not exactly an improvement over VL300, They come up with way too many lights variations without differentiating them
A few months ago I bought my first COB light, the ML60bi. When investigating the other Godox light I came to the conclusion that if I ever want to shoot a (amateur) film I might be limited by the lack of DMX control. So for me this improvement is important. The first thing left out on (somewhat) budget lights seems to always be DXM (though the Nanlite Forza is cheaper atm). The noise is disappointing.
A really great and fair comparison here Heather. Some food for thought for when I'm up at the photography show to see the M300D in person.
Glad you enjoyed!
Another great comparison. You're getting really good at this.
Thanks so much! Glad you enjoyed
I was definitely curious about how the VL vs Knowled version would compare. I know the VL's auto fan was something I didn't like but very interesting that the VL is more quiet!
Haha yeah, I was a bit surprised too
Also, you're first to comment again... :p
Dude....how are you?
Thanks for the comparison, Heather. The VL 300's were on a sale a few months back for only $399. Glad I bought one then because they are back up to $749 on the two major photography retailers out of New York / New Jersey area, as well as that little ecommerce site run by Jeff Bezos. Regarding the handle / yoke on the VL300, to me, it looks like you have to basically rotate the light so it is upside-down so that the weight of a softbox or heavy front accessory will actually be pulling toward TIGHTENING the yoke. (Then again, I could be wrong... no one has ever accuesed me of overthinking a problem.)
That's a good point, never did try that :D
I'll have to see next time I've got them both out
Super presentation as usual. Thanks so much 'Heather'. Have I said you're an inspiration today? Keep winning lady!
Thanks! Appreciate the kind words
Hope youre doing well too?
@@FellowFilmmaker all good over here. Can't complain. Thank you for the information on these lights. I appreciate them and I know I should check in on your reviews before buying. You're super! 🌹🌹🌹🌹
Glad I can help so much :)
Hey Heather. Just wanted to say hi. I hope you’re doing well. Another great review. You rock.
Hey Jeff! Great to see you in the comments as always! Hope youre having a good day
Just came across your channel a few days ago and your content and style is the best. Love the honest reviews that are so hard to come by on TH-cam.
I was wondering if you have any plans to review 2 lights. The Nanlite Forza 300B II Bicolor is one. It looks like a huge upgrade ove the previous generarion and closer to Aputure quality.
The second light is from a cheaper brand, and I feel ridiculous mentioning it. But GVM releases a pro series tomorrow. Specifically the GVM-PRO-SD400B. It's priced higher then their older series that was plastic. It actually looks like these might be a little more solid. I'm not suggesting one of the lower powered lights because they dont include the control box or battery power options.
Anyway, great material and presentation. I plan on getting your course soon. I usually shoot Real Estate, but my girlfriend wanted to revamp her candle website and wanted a video. So I rented a Macro lens, Probe Lens, and the Aputure ls 300x with a softbox and ended up having a blast. Now I'm in the market to buy a light and that lead me to your channel. Look forward to more great content.
Glad you're enjoying the channel and learning things! :D
I don't have plans at the moment to review those lights in particular. As I'm sure you imagine there are alot of lights out there and many folks have different ones that interest them. But I'll keep them in mind :D
Great honest video. I have the VL300 and it suffers from quality control issues. I own several Godox lights yet the VL300 is my most expensive and the only one to have problems. The v-mount battery power no longer works( main reason I bought it) after only a few months. I've seen many complaints of this light failing to power on, fan issues, etc. Wish I knew that before purchasing it.
Yeah, I've seen alot of folks saying they have issues with it. Shame.
@@FellowFilmmaker fellow do you still have vl300? Is it performing well? Without any issues with power and what other have complained about?
If my main reason for getting a light, it to use a fresnel w/ it, which one (or brand) would you recommend? Aperture? Godox? Something else?
My purpose for using it is to have a way to send some soft/diffused light to light up something like a plant in the background.
I've only got the Aputure and Godox ones. But generally speaking each brand tends to only work with their lights, since each chip is located at a different distance on each light.
Oh! Perfect, I've been thinking about adding a more powerful light to my setup!
Hope this helped :D
@@FellowFilmmaker Haha, well, I was planning on getting the VL300 to match with my VL150, but now I'm not so sure. Then again, I tend to overthink every purchase beyond whats healthy ;)
The vl300 is good for what it is, and the modifier I couldn't get to work on it well was 150cm, so there's that :D
Adorama is running great deal now. I just bought VL300 for $359. I am concerned about the knob since I use parabolic 48 inch. Can it hold it?
The VL300 can do 90cm well, I've tried it on a 48in once and it didn't do great if I recall. So, I'm not sure if it'll work but you can try it out.
Nice video Heather!. As a VL300 owner, I have to agree about the control box, although it's just a minor issue for me, not a big deal at all. When it comes to the yoke, I haven't had any issues when using a Light Dome 2 (gel holder included) or the projection mount, so, I guess, unless you're using 150cm domes, you should be fine. Anyway, the VL300 was a great purchase for me, specially since I got it 40% off retail for a black Friday-like event last year here in Chile. I'm sad to hear about the noise issues in the new one!!
Yeah, it was with 150cm domes that it wasn't handling well
Hope the video was a help to you :D
fantastic breakdown and comparison :-) thanks for putting this video together for us all :-)
My pleasure!
Great tutorial, I have question regard the knowled m300d with the v mount battery
can I use it to compensate with the sunlight I want to backlight my subject with the sun and I light my subject with m300d , here is my question will the subject illumination equal with the background lit by the sun
TBH I still would love to see Aputure make an 300W version of LS 600c Pro, which could use Mini-LEDs given the lower wattage. The Fresnel 2X, Space Light and Lantern accessories could also come in the kit, still with support for accessories that satisify the 600c Pro.
They might eventually make one, who knows
Hopefully my godox ml60 still holds pretty good for me! Awesome video Heather, very informative 👍
I'm sure it will! I still use and love mine :D
any chance we can see a godox vl300 ii vs sz300r vs amaran 300c ....is it easier to just gel the vl300 ii ?
I got a rare request to video a few speeches for a book release party in a large ballroom. Pretty much none of the lights I own (mostly for interviews, basically softboxes with some LED bulbs inside) will work well. I have a limited budget for the shoot, but would prefer to buy (but could rent) a light. Any recommendations on something I could put closer to the back of the room and focus on the speakers that would still create a good video light?
I think in that type of case, if you aren't going with softboxes since they will be ineffective in a large ballroom, you'll want to go with fresnels or spotlight attachments on 300-600w lights. To but those outright if you don't own them will get costly. Not to mention the look you get is more of a showhost look. If you wanted to have lights that are more soft and tv broadcast studio look, then you'll go with panel lights mounted close to the talent (within 10ft) and above them if the ceiling is low enough (if not then it might not be worth the effort of ceiling mounting, which btw has more risk of falling on someone so be sure you have insurance and liability insurance).
So safest bet is spotlight attachments, in my opinion, as they are more versatile and controllable as well as a natural brightener to the lights you are using.
I have a video on spotlight mounts and light modifiers if you want to learn about them.
Also, I recommend Aputure for best quality of light. Godox if you need to save a few bucks.
Great review - as usual! I don‘t like fan noise, so the M300d is probably not for me, unless I would only want to use it at 25% max power. However, other lights might be better in this respect.
Very true
Does the fresnel have a barn doors option?
It appears so: bhpho.to/3AsgA2U
Hello Heather. Top notch comparison as usual. I noticed at 3:28, when you are talking about the yoke's inability to hold heavy modifiers, that there is some kind of disc between the two halves of where you secure the yoke in position, and it seems that disc would interfere with the meshing of the teeth on each half. Have you tried removing that disc and tightening the yoke without it? It also seems strange that Godox would put noisier fans on the new light. From what I have seen of light reviews over the years it seems the majority of the video community is concerned with fan noise. I know I am.
I had not tried that, but I dont know if it would help… hmm
And yeah, not certain why the fans are so noisy this time round
@@FellowFilmmaker - I would guess they put that disc in there to reduce the teeth engagement while making adjustments, but instead it appears to be just an obstruction to the teeth. Give it a try (This is the Journeyman Toolmaker part of me coming out).
@@northcoaststudios thanks for that tip gonna gave ago at that👍
@@lukeworsey - Super. Let us know if there is any improvement. If not, well, now we know for sure.
interesting... I was about to get the vl300 a few months ago because it had an amazing sale on b&h, but a in the reviews on the site people said it stops working in a few months, :/. Have you had any reliability issues with the 300? I haven't with the vl150.
Only issue ive faced is it not being strong enough to handle heavy accessories. Its not done anything crazy otherwise.
I love your Honest Opinion! Btw u r Awsome!
Thanks! So glad you enjoy what i do 😁
Thanks for the review, Please I have some questions for you to make my investment decision. If M300Bi is £948, and M600D is £942 will you trade off Bi for power or will you invest in M600Bi of £1574.00 over M600D of £942.00. And, with your experience, what do you think the fans on both, are they too loud for interveiw set ups. I owned couple of Godox UL due to fan. Thanks
So, with bi color you will always lose a bit of brightness, it's just how it is. Unless you are trying to compete with direct sunlight often you can use the bi-color, I think it's great and useful. And yes, bi-color will always cost more since there is more going on in the light than just daylight only.
I think the fans are reasonable, they are a bit "noisy" in pitch quality, but if you don't have mics within 3ft of them you'll likely be fine.
@@FellowFilmmaker Thank you very much
@@sahidsanusi2653 Davinci Resolve will cut the fun noise, and if you do not have Davinci Resolve, there are other Ai solutions that will remove any noise and keep human speech, etc. Noise fan should not be something we care in 2023 and going forward with the Ai innovations
Can you use Adorama affiliate links? I only shop there and B&H.
I have adorama affiliate links on my smoke machine video if youd like to use them. Or if there is a specific one youd like ill get it for you
I also have b and h as well 😁
Hello, would you recommend a small rig 120b for 260$ or a Godox UL 60 for 180$? Thank you in advance!
I've not used the small rig so I can't say for sure
But the UL60 is great if you want utter silence on set. I use it as my keylight in my current TH-cam setup :D
@@FellowFilmmaker awesome, I ordered one plus a small rig r55 softbox , hopefully it’ll make a good small space key light combination!
Nice! I hope you enjoy :D
How small is your space?
@@FellowFilmmaker it’s a 10x10 room but double as a storage space lol
I have a desk set up and wanted to mount the ul60 on the ceiling or wall.
Do you believe the Ul60 is bright enough for one person? The Vl150 was on sale also and they weren’t too far apart in pricing.
UL60 is perfect for one person :D I do it all the time
And mounting from the ceiling would certainly save on space! Are you going to use varipoles overhead or just screw into the ceiling?
The yoke does suck if your into large parabolic’s & the control box is a bit big! That said I’ve been using the VL for over a year now and it’s a good light. Much cheaper than Aputure and the results are certainly comparable. Don’t think I will be running out for this updated version thou. I think I would take quieter fans over the box and the yoke update for now. Nice review thou!
Glad I could help you out with this video :)
Is light different with these compare to led-panels?
what do you mean?
@@FellowFilmmaker I use only led-panels, and sometime wonder should I need that "traditional" kind of light or not. It might have more power, operating distance, targeting.., maybe to use with softbox? With led panel I don't use softbox and that is something what I would like to try.
The benefit to a COB light is that it is a hard light that you can turn into a soft light if you want, or keep it a hard light and do a lot of lighting effects with. So with a hard light you can use a spotlight modifier for instance to shape the light into certain patterns or only hit certain parts of a scene or object. An panel light is hard to control but can still be great for lighting large areas or creating even lighting.
@@tapiorinne I use LED panels a lot (they have no fans and thus no noise), but as Heather suggests there is light spill everywhere (which is ok in my setting). If all you are looking for is soft light and you‘re fine with having the light all over the place, panels can do the job. I run my panel through the translucent layer of a 5-in-1 reflector with the LED panel mounted at a good distance behind it, resulting basically in a soft light source with a diameter of 120cm. However, as I said, that light bounces all around my room, so I cant have background illumination which is as nice as Heather‘s. You can use cardboard or foam boards to keep the light from going everywhere, but I guess it would be simpler to use directional lighting to achieve the same (or better) results.
Well said!
I hate fan noise. It keeps making low noise in the background. Now I stay away if there is a fan in the products.
Yeah I get that
I like my fanless Godox lights, really nice
You should do a comparison and cross comparison of the Aputure vs Godox fresnels.
There's a thought, I'll have to look into it perhaps
Nice! So which is your every day light?
M300d is the one I'm sticking with since I enjoy the control box more. But I'd be using it more in product video rather than my TH-cam talking head
Best to avoid the Godox VL300. Used mine once a month ago then it stayed in the case... tested it the night before a shoot a couple weeks ago and it malfunctioned. The fans wouldn't turn on until it overheated, fans came on, light went off... cooled off, light came on... this would happen every 60 seconds or so. There's lots of posts and videos online where others are having the same problem. I got hold of B&H and it's since been sent back, money refunded.
Sorry to hear that! Glad you got a refund
Nice
Thanks :)
Uploaded early this time? 😉👌💜
That I did :D
I think they're both look like two different brand of light and Godox just slap their brand on it. so it was not exactly an improvement over VL300, They come up with way too many lights variations without differentiating them
It wasn't the best improvements in terms of leaps and bounds
@@FellowFilmmaker yes, even the fan noise I think the should be able to make it the same as VL series, not made it worst
A few months ago I bought my first COB light, the ML60bi. When investigating the other Godox light I came to the conclusion that if I ever want to shoot a (amateur) film I might be limited by the lack of DMX control. So for me this improvement is important. The first thing left out on (somewhat) budget lights seems to always be DXM (though the Nanlite Forza is cheaper atm). The noise is disappointing.
That's a good point :)
what an "enlighting" video.
Haha, clever! :D
🤣🤣