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> satellite dish, silvered, with an LED array at the focal point An example from DIY Perks YouTube channel [0]. [0] Building an artificial sun that looks unbe

> satellite dish, silvered, with an LED array at the focal point An example from DIY Perks YouTube channel [0]. [0] Building an artificial sun that looks unbelievably realistic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bqBsHSwPgw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bqBsHSwPgw

hinkley 4y ago
I forgot how complicated his solution ended up being. Also he seems to have lucked out that the cone of light from his LED was compatible with the mirror. Too narrow a beam would have made the window need to be smaller.
- BizarroLand 4y ago
  Not to mention that the light source is a several hundred dollar very high CRI LED with exacting power requirements. It's a cool technology feature and a beautiful experiment and short film but not exactly easily attainable to the general public. If you make a similar system with a cheap 100 watt LED you're not going to get the same results.
  - hinkley 4y ago
    Since I have enough light these days, I'll probably attack this problem from the other end. There's a thing called a Light Shelf, in which instead of mounting top-to-bottom blinds on a window, you install a shelf a distance below the top of the window, and a blind below it. The shelf is sized and placed so that no direct light gets into the room. Instead the light passing through the window is incident on the top of the shelf, and bounces onto the ceiling. This not only creates more hours of indirect sunlight (nobody ever prioritizes cycling the blinds to optimize for daylight), it also moves more of that light into the center of the room. I have one window that's a tough size and location for blinds, and the time of day when the light hits me in the face is pretty close to the time when a light shelf would work.
    - laserlight 4y ago
      Wow, thank you for mentioning light shelves. I've had the idea without knowing about them. Now I can research better.

hinkley 4y ago

I forgot how complicated his solution ended up being. Also he seems to have lucked out that the cone of light from his LED was compatible with the mirror. Too narrow a beam would have made the window need to be smaller.

BizarroLand 4y ago
Not to mention that the light source is a several hundred dollar very high CRI LED with exacting power requirements. It's a cool technology feature and a beautiful experiment and short film but not exactly easily attainable to the general public. If you make a similar system with a cheap 100 watt LED you're not going to get the same results.
- hinkley 4y ago
  Since I have enough light these days, I'll probably attack this problem from the other end. There's a thing called a Light Shelf, in which instead of mounting top-to-bottom blinds on a window, you install a shelf a distance below the top of the window, and a blind below it. The shelf is sized and placed so that no direct light gets into the room. Instead the light passing through the window is incident on the top of the shelf, and bounces onto the ceiling. This not only creates more hours of indirect sunlight (nobody ever prioritizes cycling the blinds to optimize for daylight), it also moves more of that light into the center of the room. I have one window that's a tough size and location for blinds, and the time of day when the light hits me in the face is pretty close to the time when a light shelf would work.
  - laserlight 4y ago
    Wow, thank you for mentioning light shelves. I've had the idea without knowing about them. Now I can research better.