The basis of photography is light. When you want to focus on the quality of the images you want to produce, you have to pay great attention to it. First, the ambient light and all the surfaces it will reflect on. To work with light we can use reflectors and diffusers. Then we can add artificial light. Mainly thanks to the flash. But also with continuous LED light systems.

I had the pleasure of testing the ROTOLIGHT NEO2, light, compact and very easy to use.
This type of light is normally more for video use, but it lends itself very well to photography in a lot of settings and I’ll explain how I used it.

She was useful to me when I was covering events or on client shoots.

The huge advantage over flash is that you can see the result directly and you can manage the shadows much better.

It also has the huge advantage of being able to adjust the color temperature from 3,150 to 6,300 K. I’m going to make a video for you to show you how I go about matching the temperature with the ambient light.

Examples in practice

Here in the early morning in the park of Bardenas Reales in Spain, I want to show the beauty of this wild nature. Here, the small flowers of a bush.

I equip myself with my Fuji XT1 on which I mount a Nikon 105mm F2.8 macro lens, which I put on a tripod. I position myself with the sun in front of me at 45 degrees, to have the light that enters the plant and makes beautiful little bokeh balls in order to have a beautiful background.

I do an exposure on the background, just a little bit underexposed. Then after adjusting the color temperature of the NEO2, I bring it closer to the small flowers with the angle that I like best.

Also in Spain, this time in the South, near Cadiz. I’m covering an Acroyoga festival. All day long I shoot in the light of day.

In the evening, a show in a room with very little light. I have the XT1 with the XF35mmF2 WR and the XE2 with the Samyang 12mmF2. Then the NEO2 in hand. That’s a lot to handle, but these cameras are convenient to use with one hand. I capture the atmosphere with the 12mm and some portraits with 35mm.

To add diversity to the content I capture details with the idea of making the image that blasts! (expression of a photographer friend). To add when viewing the series of images, a “Wow!” Effect. These jewels, I know that by positioning myself on the side, I would have a beautiful composition and the reflection of the light will make all these beautiful balls of bokeh.

And some wild flowers from this exceptional place. The sun setting behind the hill. I take advantage of the last moments of golden light. Always the same process with the sunlight behind at 45 degrees and the NEO2 in front.

Another context, I shot two models. I took them to a beautiful little corner of nature and I guided them on several different spots to have a nice diversity of compositions, elements of nature and light. Equipped with a Fuji X100F, a mid-size reflector and the NEO2 hanging on my belt. I mainly used the reflector when light was available. But there were those situations where it wasn’t, and that’s where NEO2 comes in.

SOOC stands for Straight Our Of the Camera. That is to say that what you see is the jpeg file which comes directly from my X100F without retouching in post production.

For Fuji users, you can go to the Fujixweekly site where you will find a whole set of “recipes” which are settings to obtain a rendering close to classic film.

Here I saw the last light of day reflecting in the water. I placed my models right in front and I brought back just the right amount of light to make them stand out, with the NEO2.

It is therefore a very nice tool, which allows you to balance the lighting of your images in a compact format. I only used it in continuous light, which I preferred to using flash. For Canon, Nikon and Sony users, you can also use it as a flash, with the high synchronization option and no recycling time.

You can find a review with more details and lab tests on newsshooter.com and another on dpreview.com

Do not hesitate to ask me questions if you want to know more.