Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Easy-to-use professional-grade lighting

The best ring lights aren’t just for elevating your social media content — they can help you look professional on team calls too. The Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit, which includes the NEO 2 light panel, a tripod and a set of filters, is perfect for those who want to look like they mean business.

The NEO 2 panel is bright and powerful, and boasts great color temperature variation. Setting up the Video Conferencing Kit is a piece of cake. Images taken using the light appear true to life, and I especially like how portable the kit is. However, if you want to use it on the go, you’ll need six AA batteries, and the kit itself is quite expensive.

For the complete breakdown, read my full Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review.

Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? A video conferencing kit which includes a light, tripod and four filters
• Who is it for? For remote workers who spend a lot of time on team/client calls and need to look professional
• How much does it cost? The Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit is available for $339 / £249 but we’ve seen it drop to $149 / £129
• What do we like? Setup is quick and easy, it is portable, color temperature variation is great, and images/videos appear true to life
• What don’t we like? Six batteries are required for portable use, the filters don’t add much, and the kit is expensive

Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Specs

Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Price & availability

The Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit is available for $339 / £249 directly from Rotolight. At the time of writing, the kit is down to just $149 / £129 which is a fantastic deal. The kit includes a NEO 2 light, a desktop light stand, a 360° ball head, and four filters/diffusers.

It sounds like a lot of money, but if you want a lighting kit that gives you a professional look while being easy to use, it’s worth the premium. The Westcott 18-inch Ring Light Bi-Color LED Kit ($189) is cheaper and geared towards professional photographers, but it comes with a really tall tripod that won’t fit on a table and isn’t as portable, unlike Rotolight’s offering.

Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Design

The Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit is easy to set up and use, as assembling it took me just under five minutes. The NEO 2 light panel is dotted with several LED lamps and a round Rotolight logo graces the center.

There are three tripod threads located around the NEO 2’s frame, so not only can you mount the light panel onto a tripod, you can also attach the included smartphone mount to it, making it more versatile.

For instance, say you’re taking a team or client call on your phone. You can simply mount your smartphone onto NEO 2 and look professional in no time.

The Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit also includes a 360° ball head which attaches to the tripod. This enables you to angle the light panel as needed even when it’s stationery on your table. The tripod itself can be extended in five steps to give the light panel more height, offering some versatility.

You can easily carry the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit in your backpack or laptop bag when you’re on the move too, thanks to its highly portable design. The kit weighs just under 14oz so the weight is negligible.

Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Controls

Adding to the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit’s appeal is its straightforward control scheme. You don’t need to be a light panel wizard or be well-versed in the art of lighting to figure out how the kit works. The back of the NEO 2 head houses two bright red buttons/dials: rotating the one on the right lets you adjust the color temperature (in 20K steps) while rotating the left adjusts the brightness (in 1% increments).

Pressing both the dials together opens the advanced menu where you can access features such as FLSH (for macro or flash photography), FADE, SFX (for cinematic special effects), F-DIM (shows the brightness setting as an accurately calculated aperture), and more.

Also located on the back is a 3.5mm flash sync socket for third-party flash synchronization, which adds extra functionality in case you’re also a photographer who does video calls. This makes the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit a good choice for photographers who want to use a multi-flash setup.

It’s important to note, though, that the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit doesn’t feature Bluetooth connectivity, there’s no companion app or music sync either.

Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Power

There are two ways to use the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit: you can either plug it into a wall socket via the supplied AC adapter, or use six AA batteries if you’re on the move, and these will last you just under three hours. That’s a lot of AA batteries. The good news is that the NEO 2 is compatible with rechargeable batteries, if environmental impact is a concern.

If you want a ring light that lasts longer and can be used away from mains, the Westcott 18-inch Ring Light Bi-Color LED Kit uses an NP-F750 battery (and comes with an extra in the box), making it ideal for on-location shoots. But it figures that the NEO 2 doesn’t utilize NP batteries as it’s a tiny light, and AA batteries make more sense.

Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Performance

On average, I spend three hours on team calls every week. Usually, I keep my camera turned off as many others do — but using the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit has made me want to keep my camera on. I don’t think my face has ever looked better on Google Meet and Zoom calls.

To test the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit, I used the tripod to place the NEO 2 next to my laptop, and I used it to light myself during team calls — and it lived up to my expectations.

Color rendering index

The NEO 2 has a CRI (color rendering index) of 96. Measured on a scale of 0-100, the CRI tells you how accurately a light lights up the subject. A higher CRI means that the light ensures that subjects appear true to their original color. Lower values indicate more color distortion, so you want the CRI to be as close to 100 as possible.

This is where the NEO 2 excels. In comparison, the RL48-B in the Rotolight Ultimate Vlogging Kit ($109) has a CRI of 95. The NEO 2, however, is edged out by the cheaper Neewer Basics BR60 5-inch ($21), which has a CRI of 97, but it’s a very minute difference.

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With the NEO 2 on, I found that I appeared more natural on camera — and I appeared as I do in the mirror, which is my true self. You can see the difference in the gallery above. The first photo was taken in natural lighting on my MacBook Air M2, and the second was taken with the NEO 2 turned on.

I much prefer the look of the second photo. The lighting appears evenly spread across my face too (but this will, of course, depend on the light’s positioning). In the second image, there isn’t as much noise and grain as there is in the first one.

Color temperature

The NEO 2 has a color temperature of 3150 to 6300K — lower values for warmer tones and higher values for cooler tones. I usually prefer cooler tones in my photography, so it comes down to personal preference.

The RL48-B in the Rotolight Ultimate Vlogging Kit has a fixed color temperature of 5600K, unless you use the included filters. Also, the NEO 2 can go slightly warmer and cooler than the Westcott 18-inch Ring Light Bi-Color LED Kit too, which has a color temperature of 3200K to 5600K.

Image 1 of 2

The good news is that you can experiment with the NEO 2 to find the one best-suited for your skin tones or the environment you’re in. The first photo in the gallery above was shot at 3150K and the second was shot at 6300K to show you the two extremes. Both images look great but the second image appears more true to life as, without any lighting, the wall is blue in color.

Filter set

As I mentioned earlier, a four-piece filter set is included in the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit: 216 (Full Diffuser), 250 (Half Diffuser), 184 (Cosmetic Peach), and 279 (1/8 Magenta). Filters, basically, enable you to alter the color temperature even further.

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I found loading the filters easy to do too. All I had to do was place one of the filters on the light and lock the filter holder into place, and I was good to go. With the color temperature set to neutral (around 4500K), I took a few photos of myself with all four filters, as you can see in the gallery above.

The first image was shot with the 216 Full Diffuser, the second with the 279 1/8 Magenta, the third with the 250 Half Diffuser, and the fourth with the 184 Cosmetic Peach filter. I don’t think any of the filters make much difference, as you can see above. The one that works best is the 216 Full Diffuser which has slightly softened my face.

The NEO 2 does have a small issue, though: it doesn’t feature RGB lighting which may limit its use in professional photography. RGB is useful in panel lights for coloring a background blue, for example, while using another light to light up your face at 5500K. Not having RGB removes flexibility.

Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit review: Verdict

The Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit is a premium lighting solution that delivers professional-quality illumination not just for video calls and virtual meetings, but also for content creation, thanks to its versatile and portable design. The included NEO 2 light panel is bright and powerful and boasts great color temperature variation. It makes images and videos appear true to life, and a straightforward control scheme ensures that nearly everyone can use the Video Conferencing Kit.

You don’t always need to be near a power socket as the NEO 2 can be powered by AA batteries… but you’ll need six of them. The Video Conferencing Kit doesn’t come cheap either, retailing for $339 / £249. And while the inclusion of four filters is appreciated, in my testing, they didn’t add a world of difference to the photos.

If you can afford it, or you need a lighting solution that makes you appear professional on camera, then the Rotolight Video Conferencing Kit should be right up your alley.