Best camera flash for portrait photography: 6 models tested and rated

jmeyer | Accessories | Reviews | 26/02/2013 11:45am

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Rotolight RL48-B Creative Colour Kit

Price: £170, $200
Buy it: www.rotolight.com

This kit is based on a ring of LEDs powered by three AA batteries. It comes with a hotshoe mounting adapter and a collection of Lee filters, for balancing the colour temperature and adding coloured light effects.

There’s no facility to control the strength of the output, so ND filters are also supplied, all of which fit into the lighting ring.

The Rotolight kit has two drawbacks. First, the low light intensity gives a limited shooting distance, making it more suited to macro than portrait photography.

Second, the hole in the ring is too small to fit around camera lenses, so it has to be used off-axis.

Pros… Constant lighting will appeal to video shooters
Cons… Limited shooting range, won’t fit around camera lenses
WE say… Only really works as a supplemental fill-in light

Score: 2/5

PAGE 1: Ray Flash Adapter
PAGE 2: Rotolight RL48-B Creative Colour Kit
PAGE 3: Orbis Ringflash
PAGE 4: Nissin MF18 Macro Flash
PAGE 5: Bowens Ringlite Converter
PAGE 6: Lencarta Safari Li-on Ringflash Kit
PAGE 7: 5 things to look for in a flashgun for portrait photography