Hive lighting are well-known for their plasma lights – which makes the Wasp 100-C a departure for them as it’s based on five-colour LED technology.

After a successful Kickstarter last year, it’s now being delivered to backers and will shortly be available to buy, with delivery anticipated for July.

Best of both worlds?

The company claim it offers the best of RGB and bi-colour style LED fixtures, using five-colour LEDs to make up white light. This results in fully saturated colours – reds are truly red, greens truly green – and very accurate control, down to increments of 1°K. The aim is to provide the flexibility of a gel pack without the need to actually carry a gel pack around with you.

Wasp 100-C colour temperature range

The light’s colour temperatures range from 1,650K – 8,000K and Hive reckon intensity should be about the same at 3,200K and 5,600K: roughly comparable to a 650W tungsten fixture. Output will drop slightly if you’re using the light as a pure colour – but then that’s true if you’ve heavily gelled a light as well.

Accessories, compatibility

The Wasp 100-C is a par-style light that comes with a 22° reflector as standard and three spreading lenses that can take the beam spread up to an 80° flood. What’s more interesting though is that the mount on the front of the light is compatible with all sorts of pro photo gear: everything from Chimera and Elinchrome softboxes to Hive’s own 10° long-throw reflector and mini source four adapter for even tighter beam control.

We’ve been seeing a lot of manufacturers adopt the monobloc form factor for LED lights recently. It’s a nice change after the relative ubiquity of 1×1 panels, and means it’s often easier to shape and control the light using a variety of accessories.