I was recently sent a GVM B100C (also available on Amazon), which is a foldable LED light. As you can see in the last slide, it’s quite compact, but it’s also quite bright and very versatile. This versatile rgb led video light has several different effects modes, including my favorite, “hue loop” which cycles through all the colors of the spectrum. There are also gel modes, which allow me to select different gel codes from Rosco. I can also manually set the mix of red, green, and blue. On top of all that, there’s an app to remotely control the light. I wish I had this light years ago!
To get a sense of its capabilities I did a shoot with Rachel Luree and used the light in two different setups (see behind the scenes images below).
As I teach in my workshops and mentioned in my book, Chroma, shadows are placeholders for other light (or colors). Because of this, for the first scenario I lit Rachel with a hard light (Godox AD200 in snoot) which created long, deep shadows. Next, I placed the GVM B100C on the ground below her in order to fill in the shadow areas. Because the light is so slim, it was nearly flush with the ground, allowing me to light the shadow areas without the light itself appearing in the images.
I set the B100C light mode to ‘hue loop” so that it constantly changed colors through the whole color spectrum. Then I made 2-second exposures, moving the camera throughout the exposure. This made the motion blur change colors in a single image.
For the second scenario I once again explored long exposure, this time placing the light to the side of Rachel. I changed the LED to “gel mode” and picked an orange color, to complement the cyan gel on the strobe. Then I made half-second exposures while I moved the camera. The strobe froze her while the camera movement pulled the orange light from the B100C into long streaks that resemble flames.
