turboBB's 2012 Memorial Day Weekend Camping Report (24 XM-L lights, beamshots, vids)

It's been almost a year since I published my Sunwayman T20C review (with pics and testing conducted mostly at the camp grounds off of Ft. Getty Rd. in Jamestown, RI). At the time, Cree's XM-L was just beginning to be widely adopted in the industry. Since then, they have not only become widespread but are pretty much the de facto LED used by the majority of lights being released (especially in multiple formation).

It will eventually be replaced by the next brighter LED but until then, here's a quick summary of my experiences while conducting beamshots and usage of 24 lights.

The chaos the night before setting off:


All lights and their batteries were packed into these 3 bags:


We ended up going to the same location this year. This time, given the outputs and capability of the lights I brought along, I decided to do long distance beamshots. Unfortunately time and weather didn't allow me to conduct mini vid reviews of all the lights so I'll be supplanting ones without vids with text summaries.

Here are the lights in alphabetical order by mfg:



LONG DISTANCE BEACH SHOTS
Given there was heavy misting both nights, I limited the long distance shots @ 500ft (152.4m) that were done at the nearby beach:

The upper-right arrow indicates location the camera was setup and the oval in bottom-left was the target at 500ft away.

Here is the control shot and close up of the target (doesn't match the beamshots exactly since I didn't have the tripod at the time):


Here is a control shot at night, there was some ambient light plus the moon was out (waxing crescent phase) but didn't contribute to any of the lighting in these shots (at least in the path of the beams) as far as I could tell:


All shots were taken w/Panny FZ150 on M mode, ISO400 and AWB. Exposure was locked at 1" @ f/2.8. At these distances and especially for lights w/a broad hotspot, my aim may not always be perfect (e.g. EYE25 vs. EYE30) but in some shots, it looks like I'm aiming lower but it's actually centered.

As mentioned, there was heavy misting both nights but it should still give you a good idea of the beam profile and throw capability of these lights (plus how many mist beamshots have you seen ). Without further ado, here are the beamshots!


Elektro Lumens Big Bruiser (review)



FoxFury Rook CheckMate (review)



Klarus XT20 (review)



Lighten7 Elite M1A (review)



Lighten7 Elite M1B (review)



Lighten7 Max L2A (review)



NITECORE TM11 (v1.12)



Niteye EYE25 (review)



Niteye EYE30 (review)



Prometheus Lights Alpha Series XM18-B (review)



Shadow JM07-PRO



Sunwayman M11R Mr. Elfin (review)



Sunwayman T20C (review)



Sunwayman T40CS (review)



Sunwayman V11R révolution (review)



Sunwayman V60C (review)



SureFire M3LT (400lms) (review)



ThruNite TN10 (1x18650) (review)


ThruNite TN11 (2x18500) (review)



ThruNite TN30 (review)



ThruNite TN31 (review)



XENO G10v2 (review)



XENO S3A
(review)



XTAR S1 Production
(review)


After these shots were done, I drove my wife and daughter back to the inn so I could also charge up for the next night's shots and vids:

CAMPING GROUND SHOTS
The next night, I stayed right by the campsite and did even closer range beam shots since the misting was pretty bad. Unfortunately there is a bit of feedback (reflection from the mist) so I took four shots of each light; two aimed at the small tree about 40ft. away and two at the tip of the taller trees in the background that are approx. 100ft. away:

When I got back, I deleted the shots that had too much feedback so as not to create a false sense of brightness, however. Overall, the shots look just slightly overexposed as compared to what I my eyes saw but not too bad.

I also managed to squeeze in a video of a few lights (full playlist here) based on use around the tent and then a quick walk around the campsite. I had to keep it low since it was pretty late and there were others already sleeping. Given I was focusing on low light conditons, I bumped the ISO to 6400 so quality isn't the greatest and the vids will be pretty grainy but hopefully it tells the appropriate story on usage. Here is a pic indicating roughly the path taken:

(image courtesy of Google maps - red arrow indicates distance to small tree)

Here's a quick vid of a walkthru of the campsite and the path I took to test the lights:
http://www.youtube.com/embed/V

This pic provides size perspective as you can see the location where I took the beach shots:

(image courtesy of maps.live.com - campsite in rectangle and the large oval in bottom right indicates target from beach shots and small circle in upper right where the camera was)

And here is a control video w/LedLenser H7 at night in the tent:
http://www.youtube.com/embed/8v3TvTi7xAU?hd=1

All shots were taken w/Panny FZ150 on M mode, ISO100 and AWB. Exposure was locked at 1.6" @ f/2.8. Again, given the heavy misting, my aim may not have been perfect for each shot so they may be slightly off but the top shot is always centered on the small tree and the bottom shot at the tip of the trees in the background.

OK, with that all said, let's start off with a control shot using a Led Lenser H7 (intentionally overexposed given it's lower output):



Elektro Lumens Big Bruiser (review)
It was tucked away in the back pouch of the Maxpedition so I missed its shots for this round.


FoxFury Rook CheckMate (review)



Klarus XT20 (review)





Lighten7 Elite M1A (review)





Lighten7 Elite M1B (review)





Lighten7 Max L2A (review)





NITECORE TM11 (v1.12)





Niteye EYE25 (review)





Niteye EYE30 (review)





Prometheus Lights Alpha Series XM18-B (review)




Mini Review/Summary
http://www.youtube.com/embed/BYjumES0KtY?hd=1


Shadow JM07-PRO





Sunwayman M11R Mr. Elfin (review)





Sunwayman T20C (review)





Sunwayman T40CS (review)





Sunwayman V11R révolution (review)





Sunwayman V60C (review)





SureFire M3LT (400lms) (review)





ThruNite TN10 (1x18650) (review)





ThruNite TN11 (2x18500) (review)




ThruNite TN30 (review)




Mini Review/Summary
http://www.youtube.com/embed/NyrckvmrmUo?hd=1


ThruNite TN31 (review)




Mini Review/Summary
http://www.youtube.com/embed/aFVRnBpXUcA?hd=1


XENO G10v2 (review)





XENO S3A (review)




Mini Review/Summary
http://www.youtube.com/embed/rt7xFtLoGVU?hd=1


XTAR S1 Production (review)




Mini Review/Summary
http://www.youtube.com/embed/bNhyOK_CKao?hd=1

Excellent beamshots, Turbo BeepBeep!

Awesome beamshots, aerial views, misc. pics and video!

Thanks turbo!

TurboBB, and your wife was soo happy you took her on this trip, except she couldn't share your joy with those 3bags full of gear!! And it must have been her best trip ever ;) sarcasm off.

It reminds me of the time I went on a trip with my wife, ending up in an argument about me not caring enough about her, but more about my stupid photography! Which was my hobby at that time.(and still is, a little bit now) :)

Mate what an awesome effort. Does your family enjoy your hobby as much as you do?

Thanks for the beam shot, really like these.
From the beam shot, I like the TN30 and TM11

Wow massive effort there, great result tho. That's a great location, you wouldn't lose anyone on that beach if you had the TN30 with you, that thing was probably getting mistaken for a lighthouse lol

Thx guys!

@ChibiM - We went with a bunch of friends so it allowed me some opportunities to escape to take these shots. :)

@MRsDNF - sadly no but that's fine. I got my kids and a bunch of others that went with us some PTech Tec Bot headlamps and they really enjoyed those at least.

I finally got my PC restored again last night so will be posting part two along w/a few vids tonight.

Cheers,
Tim

Thx to all who voted, we went w/stacked and larger. The pics (and where available a mini video review) are now up. I'll flesh out the text summaries as time allows.

If you need to access the full album for even larger shots (1280x960), click here.

Also, please provide me feedback on what you'd like to see more of next time. Barring no setback, I aim on going again some time in before Fall.

Cheers,
Tim

Those are awesome beamshots!


Thank you very much, your work is greatly appreciated, photos and videos are great.


Wow! Epic shots! :bowdown:

Thanks for sharing these!

Nice work!

Nice pics! Thx for the hard work!

Love the sea mist effect!

Fantastic work!

Awesome display of skill and equipment.

Super props for sharing too.

In addition, the wife gets just as many props as you or more for putting up with this.

If you don't mind me saying so, your wife is a jewel.

You are blessed man, big time!!Wink

Awesome thread turboBB!

Mind me asking what are the bags that you used to carry your flashlights? Are they camera bags actually?

Awesome photos! Thanks for your effort. Highly appreciated!!