What started out appearing to be a comparison between two very similar systems has yielded some interesting conclusions. In designing any complex high-performance product there are always tradeoffs, and very often the most important factor in deciding between the two is to understand what you need, and which system gets you closest to fulfilling that need. If you’re comparing two luxury cars, and you want, above all, to go fast, you need to know which car goes the fastest, pure and simple. If you want a car that goes fast, is comfortable, and will carry home your shopping bags, it’s a different decision altogether.

Out of these two systems, the Broncolor is clearly the choice where you need the absolute shortest duration for tabletop work. Here’s the twist, though. If you need color accuracy and consistency too, then you may be happier with the Profoto. If you’re shooting studio sets and need power with your stop-action duration, then you’re going to go with Profoto, from the half-power performance we’ve seen. If you’re looking for the highest consistency at full power the Broncolor comes out on top. You get the idea.

As a complete system, and in terms of general, consistent performance, the Profoto gets our vote. The controls are easy to use, and will be run correctly and easily by most assistants without any explanation. The access to the controls isn’t perfect, but the other components - the cables, locks, reflectors, heads, lightstand mounts - all add up to an easy-to-run package that will perform well, and in the background, of almost any shoot that requires this kind of system.

The Broncolor is a system that seems designed less to accommodate users, and more about a system that gives you narrow areas of remarkable performance and makes demands on the user. You get a very broad set of controls, but this gives you a control system that is more complicated to use. You get, within its strengths, a superlative system. Outside the strengths there are some serious weaknesses. Even looking at just the reflectors, if you like and want the quality of light they give you then you’re fine. If you need a broad range of light from one reflector, from very wide and even to a narrow spot, then you’re just flat out of luck. This seems to reflect, pardon the pun, the overriding philosophy of Broncolor: concentrating on a narrow set of performance parameters and forcing the user to adapt to the Broncolor system.

If you’re looking to make the purchase for your own studio then the advice would be to run some comparison testing in your studio, of the actual subjects you shoot, under actual shoot conditions. Well, maybe you can forego the Art Director hovering around the workstation, but the point is, you need to test it and compare the systems for your work, period. If you’re looking to make the purchase to stock a rental studio or department, the Profoto wins hands-down. Ultimately any differences in performance, even if they were significant, would be offset by ease of use and the proven design and durability of the system.