LightPanel
Portable LED Light Panel
LightPanel
LightPanel is an App that turns your mobile device into a flexible multi-purpose LED light panel - one that you always have with you to provide fill light for macro or product photography:
Both brightness and colour temperature are modifiable.
Colour temperature can be varied between 1,500K and 15,000K.
In addition, LightPanel can display arbitrary colours for creative lighting effects.
LightPanel can also be used as a lightbox or light table, for scanning slides & negatives or tracing artwork:
A grid can be displayed to aid alignment on the light table.
The grid can be resized and moved around.
LightPanel is available as a universal purchase for iPad, iPhone & iPod Touch running iOS 12 or later and Macs running MacOS 10.15 (Catalina) or later.
The Mac version can be controlled with the TouchBar, menus & keyboard shortcuts in addition to the interface of the iOS version.
Keyboard shortcuts also work in on iPads running iOS 13 or later with a hardware keyboard attached.
LED Panel
In this picture I'm using LightPanel as a fill light for a product photo.
I've set the light temperature to match the rest of my indoor lighting.
Lightbox
Here I'm using LightPanel to scan a slide with my camera.
I've adjusted the grid to match the size of a slide to make it easier to keep subsequent slides in the exactly the same position.
Screenshots
Controls
One-finger Drag
Change screen brightness.
One-finger Tap
Show LightPanel Settings.
Keyboard: ⌘-S
Two-finger Tap
Show or hide the alignment grid.
Keyboard: ⌘-G
Two-finger Drag
Move the alignment grid.
Zoom In/Out
Resize the alignment grid.
Three-finger Long Press
Lock or Unlock LightPanel Settings.
Keyboard: ⌘-L
Brightness Controls
As well as just dragging your finger across the display, Screen Brightness can be controlled from the Settings panel:
Choose a preset value from the brightness buttons.
Enter a direct brightness value.
Drag the slider to taste.
Temperature Controls
The approximate Colour Temperature of the screen can be controlled from the Settings panel:
Choose a preset value from the temperature buttons.
Enter a direct Kelvin temperature.
Drag the slider to taste.
Hue Control
LightPanel can display arbitrary colours, rather than using the selected colour temperature:
Tap the Hue button to quickly switch between Colour Temperature and Hue colours.
Enter or cut/paste HTML-style colour strings directly into the text field.
Tap on a colour patch to set that colour.
Tap on the colour slider thumb and drag along the slider to change Hue.
Tap on the colour slider thumb and drag up & down away from the slider to adjust Saturation.
Tap on the colour slider thumb and drag parallel to the slider to adjust Brightness.
Colour Patch Menu
Long-press on a colour patch brings up a menu with more options:
Set: Set LightPanel to the colour of this patch (same as tapping the patch).
Update: Save LightPanel colour to this patch.
Reset: Restore original colour of this patch.
Known Limitations
LightPanel has some limitations controlling screen brightness on a Mac:
LightPanel only controls the brightness of the primary display in a multi-monitor setup. Given LightPanel is intended to be used on a mobile device this is unlikely to be an issue in practice.
LightPanel can only control the brightness of a monitor if the Mac itself can control it's brightness (eg via the Display pane of System Preferences).
LightPanel cannot control screen brightness on an M1 Mac. This is because Apple have not yet provided a public API that works on Apple Silicon. The brightness controls are disabled in this case.
Support
Please email lightpanel@bulsara.com to get help or more information.
Privacy Statement
LightPanel doesn't access or store personal or device information of any kind.
Acknowledgements
App icons made by Freepik from www.flaticon.com
Music: public domain recording of Chopin's Etude No.2 in A flat Major by Donald Betts