RGB Flood Lights
Printed From: Aurora
Category: Whatever Else
Forum Name: Off Topic
Forum Discription: The name says it all
URL: http://www.aurorashow.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=830
Printed Date: 27 Apr 2024 at 7:26pm
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 9.06 - http://www.webwizforums.com
Topic: RGB Flood Lights
Posted By: bdkeen
Subject: RGB Flood Lights
Date Posted: 07 Oct 2009 at 7:16pm
|
I built 4 RGB units with 2 each (red, green, blue) MR16 LED bulbs. They work ok but wasn't really pleased with them especially when it came to color blending. Decided to replace them with something better. Just finished building 2 of the replacements and tested these on a DCx16. Very pleased with the results.
Ordered the PCBs at http://www.bigclive.com/flud.htm - http://www.bigclive.com/flud.htm , a bunch of superflux leds from ebay, stuck 2 pcb's in a 500W portable work lamp from Lowes.
Since I have 2 extra pcb's I'm planning trying to make 2 UV units using UV LEDs in 100W flood light cases. Not sure where or how I might used these but seems like an interesting project.
If I get chance will post pics on my website in the near future ------------- 
|
Replies:
Posted By: ChrisL1976
Date Posted: 08 Oct 2009 at 8:24am
|
Bruce Have you tried dimming those things? Looks like a project I may add to my list for next year. What was the total cost per unit? ------------- Chris www.lightsonsixth.com |
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 08 Oct 2009 at 10:00am
|
Chris - Dimming works good - it's slightly better than the dimming I was getting on the MR16's. There's still that low end cutoff point typical of leds but I'm getting very smooth ramps. and they are alot brighter than MR16s and color mixes are far better. I even had to settle for the 3mm greens since the chinese ebay vendor didn't have the 5mm. 54 LEDs per board, 18 each color, 2 boards per light in the 500W housing.
Estimated cost was about $30-$35 per lamp for the RGB ones.. PCBs, LEDs, 500W work lamps, resistors. Work lamps at Lowes were $10 of that cost. I'm sure you could use different housings and lower the cost slightly. I used some old PS2 extensions for power making it nice having 1 wire for the 3 channels needed - then just use ps2 extension cables to fan out from the DCx16.
It'll be slightly higher probably for the UV units since the UV led's a a bit higher in cost.
Picture of the finished product can be seen at http://www.keenlights.info/projects.asp - http://www.keenlights.info/projects.asp .
I took some quick video of side by side comparison with a 6 bulb MR16 unit (2 red, 2 green, 2 blue) and it's poseted as well. -------------
|
Posted By: wesalbert
Date Posted: 19 Oct 2009 at 4:36pm
You just cost me some time and money 
good find. I hope to get 6 to 8 boards done for this years show. ------------- 32 channels |
Posted By: LightsOnLogan
Date Posted: 20 Oct 2009 at 7:58am
|
Having been on the early end of DIY RGB solutions, let me share a tip:
If you want good color mixing, use twice as many red LEDs as you use for green and blue. ------------- http://www.aurorashow.com/"> 
|
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 20 Oct 2009 at 9:24am
|
Agreed - The experimenting I did was definitely leading to more red. I'm rather impressed with the boards I built having equal number of red, blue, and green superflux LEDs. White actually looks white, orange looks pretty much orange, etc. To be expected there's a bit of color 'shadowing' the first inch or 2 till the colors converge. Only really visable if shining directly up at the base of a wall (but an interesting effect)
I've been contemplating doing something for Trick-or-Treat night using just a single DCx16, these lights, and some sequences using pretty much just the waveform to event tool runing the colors on individually sequenced channels as opposed to using the RGB tool , mostly the reds and blues for that eriee purlple effect and shimmering the greens once in a while which produces a fairly nice whiteish strobe effect. Test runs look pretty good. Red and Blue full on are producing magenta. In this case I believe if there were more reds the red would be over powering. I just got the cheap bulk leds available on ebay. If I have some time I'll see if I can video one of these lights going through a cycle of the spectrum using the RGB tool in Aurora.
Just for grins I also built 2 single board lamps using all UV leds.. They work ok but aren't as bright as I'd like since the output on the UVs I chose is much less (around 80 mcd in the visable range - their cost is higher too). They are giving that black-light effect on florescent colors just don't have the throw distance I'd like to see - maybe around 4 to 8 feet before you really start to loose the glow with other ambient lighting . Seems to be alot of inconsistance in the UV leds as well, some are more blue than others. Not sure I'd recommend this as a UV light unless the superflux UV LEDs were brigher and lower cost. The recommended leds are 20ma - not sure I want to try using the 100ma, more expensive ones that are available. (board designer advised me against it)
Anyone considering these boards - there's alot of soldering involved so be prepared for that - about 80-90 joints per board. Desoldering as well if you get a bad LED or the polarity isn't exactly correct on the LEDs (both happened to me - the reds were reversed from the blue and green) Also I emptied out 2 RadioShacks of 150 and 220 ohm resistors till I recieved those I ordered (I just couldn't wait to tinker with these)
Total cost was approximately $25 to $30 per light depending on the cost of the 500W work lamp used for the housing (HomeDepot had some for 5.95 and Lowes was 9.95). I didn't think that was really too bad plus it was a fun hobby project. -------------
|
Posted By: LightsOnLogan
Date Posted: 20 Oct 2009 at 11:06am
|
The RGB tool in Aurora is a "reasonable approximation" of the expected color output. Given that Aurora can't know the specs of the specific LEDs you are using, combined with the fact the sRGB color gamut (used by PCs) is different than the color gamut achieved by LEDs, there is no way to make the color perfect. You might have noticed that it is absolutely impossible to create some hues of purple on a PC screen that are possible to create rather intensely with your LEDs. For a PC screen (or a television), red leans somewhat red-orange, green leans to lime green, and blue has a leaning toward green (but not so much as to make it cyan). This is leftover from the CRT days when an electron beam struck phosphors that glowed at those wavelengths... those phosphor colors were a compromise in that they were cheaper to produce than RGB accurate phosphors. As a result, the sRGB space lent itself to reasonable color reproduction in the orange-yellow area (flesh tones) at the expense of very poor purple rendering. LEDs on the other hand have different wavelength centers. While a true red LED is possible, the "super bright" variety tend to be even more red-orange-ish than the sRGB spec red. Super bright green is truly a pure green (not lime) and LED blue leans slightly toward indigo instead of green (but is far more accurate of a blue than the sRGB spec). The result is excellent accuracy in the blue-indigo-violet area of the gamut, but rather poor rendering in the orange-yellow area of the gamut (the exact opposite of the sRGB color space). ------------- http://www.aurorashow.com/">
|
Posted By: wesalbert
Date Posted: 20 Oct 2009 at 5:02pm
|
I was wondering about the thing with red. Even debated on going with 3mm blue and green, and 5mm reds. ------------- 32 channels |
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 20 Oct 2009 at 5:10pm
|
I used 5mm red and blue but 3mm green. just got the cheap bulk ones from china on ebay(
My goal was as inexpensive as possible). They didn't have 5mm green or I probably would have gotten them too.. The greens are doing just as good as the others. It's really just more the amount of viewing angle and really has little to do with the actual brightness - any of the colors causes spots in my eyes if looking directly at them straight on.
-------------
|
Posted By: wesalbert
Date Posted: 20 Oct 2009 at 6:02pm
|
I probably got them from the same place. I also got 5mm Red and Blue, but had to go with 3mm Green.
A bit off topic, but how do I end up programming them? I ordered a DC controller that should be a few weeks. ------------- 32 channels |
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 20 Oct 2009 at 6:23pm
|
the boards have 4 connection points - R, G, B, and +.. The DCx16 is positive common - you can ohm out the connectors on the board and see which wire(s) will go to the + on the board.
You'll use Aurora just light you do for the ACx16 - just pick the DCx16 when you add the controller or channel. You can control the RGB on seperate channels or you can use the RGB on ACx16 or DCx16 option and set the channel numbers appropriately.(still uses 3 channels). Setting as RGB allows the use of the RGB tool. A fade up done by starting black going to a color - color to color transitions - color to black to fade out. There's other stuff there you can do too - shimmer and twinkle.
Everything is much the same as you're accustom to - really no special 'programming' -------------
|
Posted By: wesalbert
Date Posted: 20 Oct 2009 at 7:16pm
Cool, playing with it now. All I need is the parts. I am pretty sure I can get 1-2 boards a night knocked out. Might get a couple guys from work that are good at soldering to help 
I got enough to do 20 boards. ------------- 32 channels |
Posted By: wesalbert
Date Posted: 29 Oct 2009 at 7:58pm
|
Got all the parts, boards and my DC16 today. So far in 3 hours I have 4 boards made and tested. Only messed up once by not flipping one red LED.
I'm going to get them in the floodlight cases tomorrow so I can play tomorrow night.
I need to make a minumum of 4 more boards. Will be able to wrap it up this weekend.
Then if I am able to make more, its just a perk. I have enough parts to make 20 boards.
I can't thank you enough for this find.
Thanks  ------------- 32 channels |
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 30 Oct 2009 at 8:51am
|
I made 10 boards - 8 were RGB and 2 were populated with all UV leds. I only needed the 4 - 2 board floods so the UV ones were just a fun project. I've done alot of testing with them on the basement walls. I did some quick Halloween sequences using the waveform to even tool in Aurora and plan on setting them all out tomorrow night hooked to the dcx16 while the kids at out for trick-or-treat. In my tests I've been getting a pretty nice look. -------------
|
Posted By: wesalbert
Date Posted: 30 Oct 2009 at 4:17pm
can you explain this better. I know on the LED board I have - R,G,B and +, the DCx16 has ch1 +,- ch2 +,- ch3 +,-
How is this getting connected? Am I just hooking up one positive and then ch1,2,3 - to the RGB board, or am I making a jumper from ch1 +, ch2 +, ch3 + ??
I'm a bit lost here. ------------- 32 channels |
Posted By: wesalbert
Date Posted: 30 Oct 2009 at 11:59pm
|
I got it working. I was playing with it tonight and seems to work really well. Is much brighter than the floodlight banks I was using last year. Color mixing seems to work well, fades dont really seem to be to much of a problem either.
Will have to get some video from Halloween. I put something together really quick, but I think it will work well. I had 2 kids come by tonight to see what i was doing. ------------- 32 channels |
Posted By: JonB256
Date Posted: 31 Oct 2009 at 8:15am
|
Looking through all the posts, I don't see what voltage you are using for the DCx16. I'm assuming 12vdc??? even without that info, I ordered 10 boards. I won't get them done in time for Christmas, but I do lots of little projects through the year. ------------- JonB - D-Light user |
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 31 Oct 2009 at 9:07am
|
Yup - 12v on the dcx16. I used a power supply from an old external 8mm tape drive.
Weather permitting I'll set the lights out tonight while the kids are coming around for trick-or-treat. I did some very quick sequences using the waveform to event tool on the 16 channels - pretty much just the 4 rgb floods and 2 smaller (1 board) uv lights, If I can I'll video some of it I'll post on my website somewhere. -------------
|
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 31 Oct 2009 at 7:43pm
|
Poor quality video of a Halloween sequence but I tried to get something with 4 of the flood set out shining at the front of the house - http://www.keenlights.info/projects.asp - http://www.keenlights.info/projects.asp Halloween test of flood lights
Sorry for a somewhat poor quality video - Colors are washed out in the video and were way more bolder in real life - I'll blame the operator more so than the camera.
This was a quick sequence comprised of almost exclusive use of the waveform to event tool doing very lettle if any in the eadvanced settings. I just wanted something quick and easy that would pulsate the floods with the music.
The sky opened up and it poured about 2 minutes after this video - ended the short one night show early.
I guess I should also mention that the redish flashing you see in the video was'n my lights - Fire truck partrolling while trick-or-treaters on the prowl - but it's a cool effect. -------------
|
Posted By: wesalbert
Date Posted: 01 Nov 2009 at 12:47am
|
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0plwEWQ9tVo -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0plwEWQ9tVo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3SyCYbT4JM - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3SyCYbT4JM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72CANXi8m20 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72CANXi8m20
Just something I put together really quick with 2 of the RGB wall washes ------------- 32 channels |
Posted By: brunnesa
Date Posted: 02 Dec 2009 at 11:56am
|
So each PCB requires 3 channels? I noticed that you put 2 PCB's inside an enclosure. So did you use 6 channels for that one fixture or did you jumper it? How may amps are you pulling per PCB when all LED's are on? I am looking at power supplys and trying to figure out which one to buy. Thanks. |
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 02 Dec 2009 at 1:36pm
|
I have 3 channels per light - the reds, greens, blues and + are y'd together. I don't know what amperage they are drawing but it can't be that high. I used a simple cheap old ac adapter to test the boards as I built them and the DCx16 power supply is from an old computer 4mm tape drive unit. -------------
|
Posted By: brunnesa
Date Posted: 02 Dec 2009 at 1:47pm
| Ok, well i will go with a 5 or 10 amp 12 volt DC power supply then. Any bigger than that and the dimensions of them become too large. I am planning on running 5 fixtures of two PCB's with each DCx16. So do all of the positives coming from each channel on the DCX16 get tied together and then just run one positive to each PCB? The negitives are used to trigger? |
Posted By: bdkeen
Date Posted: 02 Dec 2009 at 1:54pm
|
I checked with Darryl and the DCx16 is positive common.. I actually run them to each light then they are tied tocether inside the light. I used ps/2 cables from computers because it was conviently 6 wire and have the nice small plugs. The got some 20 to 100 foot ps/2 extensions so I can pretty much put them anywhere in the yar if I wanted. -------------
|