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Is Yongnuo An Enabler Or A Copycat?

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Two days ago The Hong Kong based gear company Yongnuo announced their next product, the YN360, an LED lit bar of light. While different in form from the Westcott Icelight, some found the comparison unavoidable.

This was not the first time that Yongnuo has products that resemble other products in the market. The YN600EX-RT looks amazingly similar to Canon’s 600EX-RT Speedlite. Yongnuo’s nifty fifty looks very similar to Canon’s at about half the price. This is all not new.

But it does pose a question which I think is best illustrated by quoting two of the comments we got on the YN360 light wand. Is Yongnuo’s story one of enabling photography to the frugal photographer or bluntly copycatting other market innovations cutting down on costs.

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Watch out Ice Light: Yongnuo announces the YN360, a full color LED light wand

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If you’ve been eyeing a Westcott Ice Light for some time, but don’t care to drop the dough on it, Chinese light accessory manufacturer Yongnuo has a new product that might interest you.

It’s called the YN360 and it’s an LED light wand designed to spice up your work in ways traditional lights can’t.[Read More…]

Yongnuo Extends Their Lens Line with A 35mm f/2 Lens

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When Yongnuo launched their nifty fifty, we knew it was likely that they will extend their lens line and start making more lenses. If you are making clone-ware it only makes sense that once you have the means to produce a product you will want to utilize those capabilities to create more similar product.

And so, Yongnuo  now announced their 35mm f/2 Lens, which looks incredibly similar to Canon’s 25 years old EF 35mm f/2 lens. (Canon since upgraded to a newer Canon EF 35mm f/2 IS USM lens)

While initial reports on Yongnuo’s nifty fifty were not that promising, we would love to see a comparison between those two lenses.

As for the striking resemblance to Canon’s Lens, aside from the fact that the Yongnuo lens has 7 blades rather than 5 (a difference we have seen in their nifty-fifty as well), the lenses bare striking resembles.

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The Pros and Cons of using Cheap China Brand Lights

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My first ever off-camera flash was a Nikon sb-24 speedlight (1988), which I got. After a while I bought my first ever Nikon speedlight an sb-600 (it was around $250 back then). I was very happy with it until I wanted to get a studio strobe. There weren’t many choices to pick from here in the Philippines; it’s either you get one that cost around $300 per strobe or you can buy a “kit” with 3 off brand studio lights, light stands and softboxes for around $220. I got the latter.

(As a reference, a 400WS Broncolor Siros 400 which is one fine branded strobe – yet one of the cheaper branded strobes – will set you back $1000. A Cowboystudio 400WS strobe will only cost $150. A Square Perfect 400W/S strobe will only set you back a $100 or so. Those 3 are obviously not comparable strobe)

CHEAP doesn’t always mean bad, I have used these lights for more than 6 years now, and I want to share with you the pros and cons of using cheap off brand lights.

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The Battle of the Nifty Fifty: Canon’s 50mm1.8 vs. Yongnuo 50mm1.8

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So, a while back Chinese flash maker Yongnuo stepped into the optics realm and started making a 50mm 1.8 (aka the Nifty Fifty, aka fantastic plastic, aka, your second lens).

The Nifty fifty was never an expensive lens, the Canon version is about $115, but if you are super frugal you may be tempted to check the $60 cheaper Yongnuo lens. Photographers Tony & Chelsea took the lens for a spin comparing it with the twice as expensive Canon version.

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Yongnuo Goes on B&H. Similarly Priced, Better Service (+lenses?)

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Yongnuo has been the goto strobe brand for many off-camera-flashers (yea, I said it). Between the low price (it’s pretty hard to beat a $60 strobe, even if entry level), the plethora of features and the compatibility with major brands systems they are hard to say no to.

The only thing that kinda sucked on those strobes was their origin, they were shipping in from China. Shipping from China means hard to exercise warranty or returns. Don’t get me wrong, if you got 4 Yongnuo’s and one was a DOA, it was still a good deal price-wise, but you ended up with one dead strobe. Add to that the fact that many eBay sellers were selling those strobes with a lesser levels of Quality Assurance and you can see why there was a certain kind of risk involved in such purchases.

But this is changing as B&H are now adding the Yongnuo brand to their catalog. This means getting the same strobes with a significantly higher level of security. As for warranty, at least the items that I checked had a Limited 1-Year Warranty.

I was kinda expecting the B&H prices to be higher than the Amazon ones, but in fact they are not:

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Yongnuo’s YN600EX-RT Now Selling, Looks Remarkably Similar To Canon’s 600EX-RT Flagship

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Earlier in august this year Hong-Kong based company YongNuo announced that they are releasing the YN600EX-RT – A Canon compatible strobe.

Some Canonistas, especially off camera flashers (AKA strobists) were pretty excited about this announcement. Mostly because the strobe was said to be compatible with Canon’s new 2.4GHz RT radio system that their 600EX-RT strobe features.  The RT is a pretty awesome TTL triggering and strobe control system working on radio rather then on IR. But, Canon’s strobe sells for about $499 while the new Yongnuo which appeared on eBay today only sells for about $185. Roughly a 1:3 ratio.

DIYP are the last to be blamed with lack of frugality, but looking at the images that popped up on YongNuo’s sites got me thinking. Look at the two photos on the top. See any resemblance (aside the obviousness of the names). The strobe on the left is Canon’s 600EX-RT flagship, and the right one is the new YN600EX-RT.

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