Zhiyun X100 RGB & M60 Ultra : Honest Review After Real Productions

There is a piece of gear advice nobody tells you when you start filming.

You can spend months saving for a new camera body, a better lens, a faster card. And the footage will still look flat. Not because the gear is bad. Because light was never part of the equation.

That is the lesson that keeps coming back on every production we run at R Studio.

And it is exactly what we put to the test with two compact lights from Zhiyun.

How We Actually Used Them

Zhiyun sent us the X100 RGB Cam Mackey Special Edition and the FIVERAY M60 Ultra for a collaboration. We were not paid to write this. Everything below is what we genuinely experienced after putting both lights through real shoots.

We received them one day before flying to Europe. So we packed them in a backpack and brought them along.

The following week we had a fitness app commercial to shoot. Run and gun. No truck, no lighting kit. Just us, a camera, and these two lights.

We shot as much as possible during golden hour to use natural light as our base. But shoots run long as you know. When the sun disappeared we used the X100 with the spotlight attachment to recreate that warm directional beam on the athlete’s face. Low angle, hard light. On camera you cannot tell the difference.

We also used the RGB mode to create a cold blue contrast on one side of the face, fake a screen reflection, and add texture to certain shots. Two lights. One backpack. That was the entire lighting kit for that production.

Back in Tokyo we used them again to shoot and help us on other run and gun productions and our Director made a video.
Watch here : Your Camera Is Fine. Your Light Isn’t.
All of it lit with these two lights.

The FIVERAY M60 Ultra

The M60 Ultra is the one that surprises people most when they see it on set.

60 watts. 430 grams. Magnetic snap-on modifiers that switch between focused, soft, and grid in two seconds. Full RGB with a color range from 2500K to 10000K. CRI 95. Up to 160 minutes on battery and it works while charging.

For a run and gun shoot it is close to perfect. It fits in a bag, it does not need a power outlet, and it gives you enough output to actually shape the light rather than just fill a room.

Price is €99. For everything listed above that is genuinely hard to argue with.

Zhiyun FIVERAY M60 Ultra : Buy Here

The Molus X100 RGB — Cam Mackey Special Edition

The X100 is the bigger unit. 100 watts, 384 grams, full RGB, same color temperature range as the M60.

We received the Cam Mackey Special Edition. The leather finish is not something we expected to mention in a lighting review but here we are. It looks and feels premium in a way that most production gear does not. Small detail, genuine impression.

The spotlight attachment is where the X100 becomes something else entirely and something we were looking to use a lot. It comes with 10 gobos — window frames, blinds, geometric patterns, light bars. In the fitness commercial we used it to fake golden hour. In some scenes we used it to create window light that does not exist. One attachment changes what the light can do completely and you can shape an emotion easily with it.

Battery at full power gives you around 34 minutes on the grip battery. That sounds short but you can plug it into DC or run it off an external pack for longer shoots. On set you just plan for it.

Both lights connect via the Zhiyun app. You can group them, control color and intensity together, and save your settings as presets. On a solo shoot where there is nobody to adjust the lights for you, that matters more than it sounds.

Zhiyun Molus X100 RGB : Buy Here

What We Actually Think

These lights work on real productions. Not in a studio with a full crew and unlimited time. On actual shoots where things move fast, plans change, and you need gear that keeps up.

The form factor is the main reason we keep reaching for them. Compact, battery powered, RGB capable, and light enough to travel with. That combination is rarer than it should be.

Battery life at full power is the one honest limitation. But it has never stopped a shoot. You adapt.

If you are a solo filmmaker, a small crew, or anyone who needs a compact lighting solution that actually performs on location — these are worth serious consideration.

Watch the full video here : Your Camera Is Fine. Your Light Isn’t.

Zhiyun provided these products as part of a collaboration. We were not paid to produce this content. All opinions are our own.