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GEARBOX
Robe
ROBIN DLS
Profile
Open and shutter case
By Jimmy Den-Ouden
The DLS Profile turned up at the
bunker in the standard Robe
apocalypse-proof road case, and
as I set it up it seemed to weigh
relatively little. 22kg in fact.
Outwardly it looks like every other
Robe fixture of its kind, a zoomy
profiley moving light thing.
Just like the DLX we reviewed a
few issues back in fact. The big
difference becomes apparent
when you switch it on.
The DLS Profile is indeed a zoomy profiley moving light,
but it has an RGBW LED engine. So instantly it’s quieter, it
runs cooler than a discharge lamp, and the colours are vivid
and immediate. Add to this a 4 blade framing shutter system
and you realize it’s not just another moving light…
Let’s look at the obvious stuff first. The base of the unit is
pretty standard Robe fare – 3 and 5 pin DMX, ArtNet, MA
Net, MA Net2 all on the expected connectors. Wireless
From quite narrow...
to very wide!
DMX optional. PowerCon in and loop out. Robe Navigation
System (RNS) menu for setup – touch screen and four
buttons. Knows when you turn it upside down. All normal,
yes? Good.
To a degree, the normality continues inside the head: 540
degree pan, 280 degree tilt. Movement happens in about
the time you’d expect – it’s quite agile. There are pan and tilt
locks for transit. There’s a rotating 3-facet 11-degree prism,
a variable frost filter, and quite a good zoom which allows a
10 to 45 degree beam angle. The single rotating gobo wheel
is indexable and has 7 slots plus an open position. The
selection of gobos includes several break-up types and other
interesting patterns – it’s nice to see some new gobos as
stock. The glass animation wheel can be used in conjunction
with gobos or on its own, and you can achieve interesting
effects playing with focus between these.
Now it all changes
The light source in the DLS Profile is an RGBW LED module,
the specific power of which we were unable to determine
from the spec sheet. Let’s just say it’s bright – you could
mistake it for a discharge fixture. In open white it performs
pretty well, but really comes into its own in saturated colour.
Under full white light in our studio, we were able to do a
wide gobo projection with prism onto a black cyc and still
see the image clearly – even in deep red and blue.