Lighting in projects.

[Vormulac]

Hi folks,

I've been asked to create a little shelving unit for the other half's nail varnish collection. It'll be going into an area without particularly good lighting so as colour is an important factor in choosing that vital nail varnish, I want to incorporate some white lighting into the unit. I'm thinking something in the underside of each shelf to illuminate the contents of the shelf below (if that makes sense). Has anyone used electroluminescent tape/wire for this sort of thing? I used EL sheets in automotive prototype work but that was more than ten years ago and I daresay things are very different now - or if not EL, how about led modules. I'm open to any suggestions.

Thanks in advance!

V.

 

[RogerS]

The key thing is going to be the colour temperature of whatever light you choose. Also whether or not the spectrum of the light is spikey at certain frequencies as this will emphasise positively or negatively the colour of the makeup. I'm afraid I can't add much more but hopefully that will give you enough to research further.

 

[paultnl]

This might work http://www.energylightbulbs.co.uk/categ ... tAodyhSNTg

 

[Lowlife]

I agree, colour temp is going to be important, all my lighting at work is 6500K daylight tubes as I need accurate colour rendition, you can get T4 (1/2" diameter tubes) which will fit nicely under a small shelf, they only run at a few watts each so are cheap.

 

[Vormulac]

I like the look of those leds strips, Paul, I wonder if you can reterminate it once you've cut it? A one metre length cut into three would probably be about right. Thanks for the comments on colour, guys - the daylight tubes sound good but I suspect would be too big for this particular project (that was why I was thinking about EL originally).

 

[OLD]

I have used t4 slimline linklite page 402 toolstation in our camera club colour print viewing unit with no complaints on colour temperature etc three sizes available recommended.

 

[Lowlife]

I like the look of those leds strips .... I wonder if you can reterminate it once you've cut it?

We use similar LED strips at work for lighting small projects, there are basically two different types, one with a moulded plastic lens/cover which encapsulates the LEDs, and one without. I can't comment on the former, but the latter can certainly be cut into sections and rewired, they're designed to be cut into multiples of 3 LEDs and each section of 3 has copper terminals at the ends to solder wires onto.

We don't actually use the encapsulated ones, but I'd imagine once cut you could bare the terminals and reconnect them?

 

[sometimewoodworker]

I like the look of those leds strips, Paul, I wonder if you can reterminate it once you've cut it? A one metre length cut into three would probably be about right. Thanks for the comments on colour, guys - the daylight tubes sound good but I suspect would be too big for this particular project (that was why I was thinking about EL originally).

You can also find a large range at
http://s.dealextreme.com/search/led++strip++warm+white.html?PageSize=100&sort=Price
these are quite a bit cheaper and there is a wider range the only difficulty is that you may not get the shorter lengths.