In Broadcast - May 2019 - 60

60

www.inbroadcast.com | Vol: 9 - Issue 5 | May 2019

InStudio

Broadcast Lighting
& Power Update
Contributing Editor Andy Stout brightens
up the scene with a look at the latest
in power and lighting kit shown
at NAB 2019...
Power
While
cameras
have
an
understandable ability to hog the
limelight, one of the most fecund
areas of any broadcast industry
tradeshow is always the rest of the
acquisition space, with lighting and
power very much to the fore. NAB 2019
was no exception to this rule, with a
serious amount of new products and
innovation on display.

PAG's new Mini PAGlink
shows connection versatility

With 4K-capable cameras getting
smaller with every iteration, PAG
has introduced a decent-looking new
compact battery system designed to
power them from a smaller footprint.
Dubbed the Mini PAGlink, the system
comprises 50 watt hour Li-Ion battery
packs and smaller battery mounts
and has been scaled down to suit
smaller camcorders and power their
accessories.
The system's MPL50 linking batteries
feature the 12 and 5-volt outputs that
the camcorders tend to lack, providing
a single power source for an entire rig,
while they also feature a fixed D-Tap
output and a removable two amp
USB that can be swapped for a Lemo,
Hirose, or another D-Tap for maximum
flexibility.
The batteries can be hot-swapped
and added, with up to four providing
200 watt hours (and up to 12A when
linked, though in practise handheld
operation will probably top out at two
of the 350g units. The Gold-Mount
version will be available in the middle
of the year, with V-Mount 'following
shortly after'.

Germany's Bebob has
released the Gold and
V-Mount versions of its new
compact 14.4 Volt battery packs
simultaneously. These are even
lighter at the small end of the scale,
the 43Wh versions of them coming
in at under 330g. They keep the
same three inch height and four inch
width dimensions as they move up the
output scale too, only an increasing
depth betraying the increase in
capacity; the 147Wh batteries
being double the 43Wh's 1.25
inches. 98Wh versions complete
the range, while a covered USB
port and Twist D-Tap output are
available to power accessories.
Away from a concentration on the
small, the company has also developed
the new B-Mount along with ARRI. This
is going to be used on all future ARRI
cameras so definitely qualifies as a big
deal, and adds multi-voltage support
(12 and 24). The underlying aim
though is undoubtedly to create a new,
universal 24 Volt industry standard,
and to that end its specs have already
been widely shared with third-party
battery and equipment manufacturers.
Bebob's first batteries for the mount
show what sort of territory we're
heading into here too by starting at
86Wh and heading all the way up to
294Wh.
Also dual voltage, but featuring just
that little bit more of it, is the 14/28
volt Helix range from Core SWX. In
fact, Core SWX claims that the Helix's
design allows it to output up to
33.6 volts, which it says means less
current draw, creates less heat, and
extends both operational runtime and
product longevity as a result. There
are a couple of next little engineering
twists to it as well. First, to ensure
the higher voltage is only transmitted
when needed, the higher volt output
only unlocks when the battery is
paired with a special mounting plate.
And secondly, there's a new version
in the pipeline that features two sub100Wh airline-approved (at least

Bebob's latest Micro batteries

The Bebob ARRI developed B-Mount

under current regs) halves for travel
that can then be clicked together
after transport to provide extended
runtimes. The regular Helix range will
be available in August.
IDX's latest stackable batteries in
its new Powerlink series, the IPL-98
& IPL-150, feature 96Wh and 143Wh
capacities respectively, with two 80W
D-Taps and one USB output to power
additional items. There's also a neat
little V-Torch LED light that makes
them easy to mount when shooting in
the dark. PowerLink allows up to
four IPL-98 / IPL-150 batteries
to be linked via V-Mount, while
also nodding towards anyone
already bought into the IDX
ecosystem by letting the last
battery be any IDX brand
V-Mount. All in all it claims that up
to 715 watt hours is possible with
the right combination of units, while
they can produce up to 14 A when
linked. A dual charger, the VL-2000S,
will charge two stacks of up to four
batteries at a time, and charges from
the top down too so that a fullycharged unit is always at the top of the
stack.
There was quite a range of new
releases from Hawk-Woods in Vegas.
The company had four new additions
to its MDV range ranging from the
two-cell, 25Wh DV-F590 to the six-cell,
74Wh DV-F990, which manages to
cram a lot of power into a 300g body.
This was tested by Hawk-Woods on
one of Atomos' latest 4K
recorders and achieved
two hours of runtime
from a single battery
while recording in 4K
at 50% brightness.

It also expanded its 14.4V BPU
range with the addition of the
BP-98UX, which comes with two
D-Tap outputs and has achieved
a notable upgrade against its
75Wh predecessor by upping its
capacity while keeping exactly the
same form factor.
Titon is the latest brand of
battery to be introduced by Anton/
Bauer and its units are both lighter
and cheaper than the company's
previous Dionic XT range (though
they also provide a lower current).
Available in both Gold and V-Mount,
the Titon comes in both 92Wh and
156Wh flavours, while connection is
provided by P-TAP and high-speed
Smart USB ports. Output is 10A.
Handily, the battery's software will
factor everything being powered by
them into its calculation of remaining
runtime too.

The new Anton Bauer Titons are lighter
and cheaper than their predecessors

Lighting
And, from the lighting side of the
equation, there was a lot to power too.
In the same way that Li-Ion dominates
the battery world at the moment,
so LED lighting has moved from the
periphery to the mainstream, and the
wares on show at NAB really ran the
gamut from the insanely bright to the
(almost) ridiculously small.
So, on one hand you had a product
like the LitraTorch 2.0 on display
from Litra which mounts 16 tiny LEDs
on the front of a cube a little more
than an inch across and produces
2200 lumens. The company bills it as
'adventure lighting', so is not
expecting to make huge inroads
into the established broadcast
market, but the reports of its
The Litra Torch 2.0 - 2200 lumens
from just over a cubic inch
http://www.inbroadcast.com http://bebob.de/en/a-mount/amicro/akkus.html http://bebob.de/en/b-mount/ http://www.paguk.com http://www.antonbauer.com/en/products/titon/ https://litra.com/ https://litra.com/
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