4 posts tagged “research”
It is red. The camera does not do it justice. red like a clock radio. I would have thought orange would be a more natural choice, but no. Red.
And "flickering" means shifting between 2 brightnesses - dim, and really dim in a semi-random manner.
Didn't even register on the light meter when I tried it, but the diffusion method was interesting (I thought at least)
Get a normal led with a beam, sand/grind the top of it off. There's your diffuse LED.
One of the things that is quite clear is that the light form a bare LED is too intensely from a single point to have as a table light, so some diffusing is in order.
This here http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrbon/3859107567/in/set-72157622151360228/
is someone who has used pingpong balls as a diffuser when making a large wall of LEDs. This is a good starting point for my experimentation into this.
Next up, my experimentation of LEDs and pingpong balls - off to the $2 shop to get some.
Origionally I was going to have people over and pizza and bbq and beer etc, but really, thats just too much for this late in the brief. There will be pizza beer and bbq once the grad show is over and all is done so these tests will do for now.
Firstly, I set up an outdoor table and umbrella. I did it
inside because it’s so damn cold outside.
Phew – just fits!
anyway, this and the light meter i got off deal extreme allowed me to check various light levels.
See my other blogpost/section of the report on light level measuerments for details about what they mean.
First test was a cheap ugly set of 5 tealight candles (ignore the lantern in the pic)
Light level on the meter was 0.8 lux – that’s on the lowest range so my fears about the meter not being sensitive enough appear to be unfounded.
The lighting was totally unacceptable to eat under. I would post a picture of it without the N97 flash, but all there was were the 5 flames visible and not focused.
Next test I got a plug in dimmer and an 80 watt incandescent light. I used a par38 spot lamp like you would use in a sensor light or similar.
A problem I found here is that the colour of the light when dimmed to 50-60 lux becomes very very orange, which makes it look a lot dimmer then the 25 lux from the camping light.
Also, at full brightness on the dimmer it gets 1500 lux, and plugged in directly it is 1650 lux – way, way too bright, and that’s a 80 watt. Time to think dimmer.
The obvious first solution is to get a non reflector lamp so that there is less coming down hitting the table. A lower wattage lamp is also an obvious solution, so a 25 watt frosted GLS lamp was swapped out.
This will dim down much better, max is 27 lux and at 10 lux it is still acceptably white.
Outcome:
10-20 lux on my meter is an acceptable value for a dining table.
This fits in with what that table off Wikipedia says.
I got some existing lighting products to see how they fared as a pathway light for outdoor use.
Initial looking at the units shows that there may be many shortcomings for them.
1 - tiki torch
pic from http://blog.pennlive.com/thrive/pick_of_the_week/ - This requires filling with an oil. There is the possibility of spillage of this when filling onto decks or paths, which may make them slippery and a hazard, and will certainly cause discoloration of them. If spilled onto a lawn then it may cause the grass to die, same for a garden.
There is considerable soot in the flame of them. This means using it under an umbrella or the eaves of a house may lead to discoloration or that.
There is the fire hazard if they fall over, oil spilling out and a flame may cause an unplanned fire.
The light pattern from them is less then ideal, The body of the lamp makes a large circle of shadow immediately around the lamp.
The bamboo posted design I looked at was fixed in length. The only way to make it lower is to push it deeper into the ground.
The large bamboo post may cause more damage to the ground then is desirable.
Refilling during use is not possible as the oil is put in where the flame is at the top of the canister. As a result the lamp has to be extinguished and allowed to cool before it can be opened.
The wick appears to need adjusting as it burns to the top of the pipe it comes out of. This means opening the canister and handling an oil soaked wick. Oil on your hands is not a good thing to do, particually if its got other stuff in it too.
Might blow out.
Good things -
Stupidly cheap - why buy one when you can have many
Not reliant on electricity.
Bamboo is sustainable material
2 - the $3.50 fake lightbulb lamp
This is powered by 4 standard AA batteries in the base of it. This empowers the user to choose a more sustainable rechargeable option if they choose to.
Light is operated by a pull string to turn on and off. This is awkward one handed.
Light has a small area under it that is dark - much smaller than the tiki torch.
Light is a very cool white/high colour temperatuer which is not pleasing to a lot of people.
Minimal control over the spread of the light, its quite in your face when on a table top.
Lamp is cheap to buy, but without also investing in rechargable cells, whats the ongoing cost going to be? Runtime unknown at this stage.
3 - The $3 mini camping light (1,2,3 dollar store)
Handle is a bit cheesy
Light source is incandescent - warmer colour and will dim more ovbious with battery running out.
switch has 2 on positions but they just do the same thing? Why bother?
small clear textured diffuser is around the lamp to make it less glarey
