Which Westcott lighting to evaluate next?

For over a decade F.J. Westcott has offered a variety of different kinds of lighting. The systems we know the best are their Spiderlite TD3 and Spiderlite TD5. We have seen the Spiderlight TD6 at their Westcott trade show booth in past years as well.

But not many trade shows in 2020, so we would like to assist our readers learn about new equipment. The new item on the www.FJWestcott.com website that caught our eye was the Westcott Solix Daylight 2-Light Kit by Jen Rozenbaum (US/CA Plug)

Since we have over a decade of experience with the Westcott Spiderlite TD3 and TD5, we can explain the benefits of updating to Westcott Solix Daylight kit (for example, occupies less space and no “light bulbs” to break!). So much easier to carry and set up (and then pack at the end of the photo shoot).

So as soon as we have the Westcott Solix Daylight 2-Light Kit we can do evaluations.

Ring Light Reviews and Comparisons: portable ring light and for studio photography

We use ring lights for most of our macro photography on-location (in the rain forests of Guatemala, Central America). We photograph mushrooms, lichens, tropical flowers, butterflies, larvae, pollinators. You can see our results on:

www.maya-ethnobotany.org and on www.maya-ethnozoology.org

When you have to hike many hours through the swamps, marshes, hills, and rain forests you tend to “travel light.” So we tend to use Metz ring lights and KAISER KR90 LED ring light.

The Westcott 18” Bi-Color LED Ring Light is different; this is for portraits, weddings, and lots of other uses. But we feel that when we are photographing remarkable plants out in the rain forests of Guatemala, there are times that an 18 inch ring light would have advantages. So we would like to try out the Westcott 18” Bi-Color LED Ring Light Kit with Batteries and Stand, with backdrop kit and storage bag.

If more people know about this equipment, more photographers can realize that this kind of ring light equipment could help them achieve better results.

Florescent lighting has many advantages for studio photography Here are examples of our years of reviews of using Westcott

A half-century ago we used Lowel lights for all our studio photography. We had suitcases filled with Lowel lights and took them all around the world to museums. Great equipment for a photographer of Mayan archaeology and art history.

But these were tungsten halogen lights, kind of hot, so a flower would wilt if these lights were in front of a flower. Plus the lamps (“bulbs”) broke easily, and in any event lasted only a certain number of hours. So for recent years we have used primarily florescent lighting from Westcott (www.FJWestcott.com).

Today (September 2020) I happened to find this report that I wrote in 2012. It was designed by then capable student photographer Sofia Monzon. Now that we will be returning to Guatemala to do more photography, whenever I find an earlier report that is still valid, I like to post it. So I thought it would be helpful to post multiple reviews of Westcott lighting that we have produced in past years.

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As you can see, the photography teams at FLAAR have plenty of experience evaluating digital camera equipment, starting circa 1998. Today we use Nikon D5, Canon EOS 1DX Mark II, and the two newest mirrorless Sony cameras. So we are familiar with the major brands.

Westcott Spiderlite TD3, TD5 and TD6, fluorescent studio lighting

We started out with Westcott Spiderlite TD3. They were so useful that when a new model became available we upgraded to Westcott Spiderlite TD5. These are the main lighting in our photo studio now for years. We would like to test the Westcott Spiderlite TD6; we use four lights (two for front, two for side or back lighting). All with softbox (really helps).

Westcott fluorescent lighting is still available on the Internet, but all the lighting offered by the FJWestcott.com website is newer models: strobes and LED. There was no Photokina 2020 due to COVID so this autumn we will be posting lots of reports on photography equipment.

Lots more subjects need good lighting equipment than just women

Most reviews of studio lighting show gorgeous women or handsome men (mostly the women). We photograph gorgeous tropical flowers and handsome plants (some trees, like Cecropia species, have female trees and male trees…) but we are interested in the biodiversity of the Neotropical ecosystems of Guatemala. We feel that botanists (and botanical gardens and natural history museums) should also have good lighting. So our reviews are focused on lots more than photographing weddings and fashion and portraits.

There is a need for photographers all across USA, Canada, Mexico, Central America and South America for photographing plants, especially flowers, but also fruits and vegetables and other parts of the plants. And for photographing food.

So we look forward to having Westcott Solix Daylight 2-Light Kit by Jen Rozenbaum and the Westcott LED ring light kit and accessories available to evaluate.

The 18” Bi-Color LED Ring Light Kit with Batteries and Stand, with backdrop kit and storage bag, we can compare pros and cons with the all the other ring lights. We also have experience with the on-camera ring-lights such as Metz and other brands.

There are four photographers at FLAAR so we have a lot of experience to evaluate camera equipment.

First posted: September 2020.