LED Bulb question

[Darrell KSR]

If you have lamps that say "use maximum ___ watt bulb," can you increase the lighting by switching from incandescent to LED?

Say the lamp says "maximum 60 watt bulb." If you've had 60 watt incandescent lighting in it, can you go to a 13 watt LED bulb (75 watt "equivalent?")

I assume that's ok?

[PedroDaGr8]

If you have lamps that say "use maximum ___ watt bulb," can you increase the lighting by switching from incandescent to LED?

Say the lamp says "maximum 60 watt bulb." If you've had 60 watt incandescent lighting in it, can you go to a 13 watt LED bulb (75 watt "equivalent?")

I assume that's ok?
Yep, within reason, that is an electrically imposed limit, not a lighting output limit. So you can use a higher lumen bulb, as long as the electrical wattage used falls below the cutoff.

[Darrell KSR]

Thanks, that will make us happy.

Sent from my SM-G900T using Tapatalk

[Doc]

I believe the wattage is there because of the heat output. LED's don't emit heat hence a meltdown isn't an issue. I could be wrong but believe that to be the case.

[ETWNAPPEL]

I believe the wattage is there because of the heat output. LED's don't emit heat hence a meltdown isn't an issue. I could be wrong but believe that to be the case.

That is correct.

[bigsky]

LEDs get hot in the back-less
so on the bulb.

[PedroDaGr8]

I believe the wattage is there because of the heat output. LED's don't emit heat hence a meltdown isn't an issue. I could be wrong but believe that to be the case.

Kind of but not exactly, the wattage there is partly the heat radiated by the bulb and partly the limits on amperage the wires/switches can carry leading to the bulb. The combination of the two is what sets the limits.


LEDs get hot in the back-less
so on the bulb.

While they do get hot on the back, it is still much lower and temperature than a tungsten filament and the cumulative amount of heat produced is dramatically lower than a traditional bulb.

[bigsky]

Kind of but not exactly, the wattage there is partly the heat radiated by the bulb and partly the limits on amperage the wires/switches can carry leading to the bulb. The combination of the two is what sets the limits. While they do get hot on the back, it is still much lower and temperature than a tungsten filament and the cumulative amount of heat produced is dramatically lower than a traditional bulb. At the museum, we will be replacing the fixtures for all exhibit lighting not just replacing bulbs, just as soon as "real color" LEDs come out.

[PedroDaGr8]

At the museum, we will be replacing the fixtures for all exhibit lighting not just replacing bulbs, just as soon as "real color" LEDs come out.

Understandable, there are some ultra high CRI (Color Rendering Index)modules are out there but I haven't seen many, if any, worked into fully functioning bulbs yet. They are likely being fabricated into custom installations for one off manufacturing due to their being quite new and having a higher cost. I would define ultra high CRI as CRI's of 97+, where 100 is any blackbody radiator like a tungsten filament. Most flourescent bulbs are in the 70-80 range, same with many of the LEDs, with "warmer" bulbs having better CRI but worse efficiency, high CRI bulbs at this time tend to fall in the 90-93 range. CRI>90 is considered ideal for full-color rendering as few people can tell the difference between these and tungsten filament bulbs. In general the highest CRI's are only essential in the MOST demanding of situations. Things like print color shade matching, medical device imaging, etc. Currently, most bulbs seem to max out at a CRI of 92, which for all intents and purposes is VERY close to incandescent (with some caveats). In a museum, I could see wanting to get the much higher CRI even if most wouldn't notice the difference just based upon principle alone.

[bigsky]

Very helpful discussion Mr Great. LEDs are interesting. They can be much more precisely focused, less easily diffused. Part of their efficiency comes from brightness. After we converted the office areas of the museum (all non exhibit spaces), We have people in offices turning off the ceiling lights, which used to be fluorescent or still are but the new whiter thinner high efficiency units, and bringing a desk lamp with an incandescent. I envision them in a different era yearning for the warmth of candlelight and firelight. LEDs are now suitable for streetlights, although their directionality leads to "strobing" of light & dark when compared to sodium vapor. And they are harder to screen out for astronomers. Still, the chance for extreme efficiency of energy use and useful life--AND dimmable for parking lots andother public lighting really makes the an attractive technology

[PedroDaGr8]

I'm actually not entirely surprised. Higher efficiency lights tend to be bluer in output spectrum. There is a lot of physics that goes into why this is, that I won't go into. It has been well shown that bluer lights can cause higher eye strain, especially as some people age this effect gets worse. This is why the xenon headlights on cars can be exceptionally annoying even when the amount of light hitting your eyes is the same as a halogen bulb. I have read a variety of theories on why this is, with most indicating it is due to the high blue content of the light but why this causes the eye strain is less certain. That being said it can be exceptionally pronounced for people that are reading printed pages due to the high contrast of black text on the bright white background.

[Doc]

Personally, I'd go with "UNLIMITED POWER"!!!

[Darrell KSR]

Very interesting discussion, and way above my head. I'm just glad to hear that I can bump up the lighting (we have poor lighting in our house anyway) without increasing an electrical issue risk.

[CitizenBBN]

Very interesting discussion, and way above my head. I'm just glad to hear that I can bump up the lighting (we have poor lighting in our house anyway) without increasing an electrical issue risk.

You should be good unless you find a LED bulb the likes of which I've never seen in a store. :)

As Pedro covered so well, those ratings are to address the heat generated by the bulb and the heat that would be generated in the wiring if too much current were to flow through. Don't underestimate how much of that is the latter, the possibility of the wiring overheating, but the LED will put out more lumens with less current and direct heat, you should be great.

Interestingly in old house wiring it's not as weak as you'd think even though they never thought a house would run 200 amps, more like 20 or 30 in that era max. B/c they weren't as sure about how little wire they could get away with for a given load, and b/c they were going to be wrapping the wire around knobs in the runs and such, they just used heavier gauge wire that can handle higher loads without heating. I still prefer to rewire everything (and I overspec that stuff too b/c I'm paranoid about wiring), but the old wiring sometimes isn't as bad as some think.

I'm following the discussion intently, esp. interested in the best lighting for photography. I'm still not happy with what I've got for picturing items, I'm wondering if I'd get better shots to go with more LED and higher CRI.

[PedroDaGr8]

You should be good unless you find a LED bulb the likes of which I've never seen in a store. :)

As Pedro covered so well, those ratings are to address the heat generated by the bulb and the heat that would be generated in the wiring if too much current were to flow through. Don't underestimate how much of that is the latter, the possibility of the wiring overheating, but the LED will put out more lumens with less current and direct heat, you should be great.

Interestingly in old house wiring it's not as weak as you'd think even though they never thought a house would run 200 amps, more like 20 or 30 in that era max. B/c they weren't as sure about how little wire they could get away with for a given load, and b/c they were going to be wrapping the wire around knobs in the runs and such, they just used heavier gauge wire that can handle higher loads without heating. I still prefer to rewire everything (and I overspec that stuff too b/c I'm paranoid about wiring), but the old wiring sometimes isn't as bad as some think.

I'm following the discussion intently, esp. interested in the best lighting for photography. I'm still not happy with what I've got for picturing items, I'm wondering if I'd get better shots to go with more LED and higher CRI.

What don't you like about your pictures? What are you using now?

[CitizenBBN]

What don't you like about your pictures? What are you using now?

I don't want to hijack, but I think Darrell's OP was well covered, so I'll leave it on this thread.

I've discussed it here some before, and got some good advice from Dan, Coastie and other shutter bugs on here, but it's still a bit of a struggle.

For our auctions we have to photograph every lot we sell to have it on the website. We have a live gallery of people but we also get a ton of internet bidding, so the more and better photos the better, it's for more than just the old school "here's what we have, come by" days.

But as you can imagine this is more of an assembly line than an artistic expression, and I don't have the time or money to really tweak each item or shot like a professional would do trying to produce high end pictures. I have to be able to get 400-800 pics done in a day and have them turn out well.

I also have inventory control issues, and i've got that licked. I used to use a great camera from Ricoh that could scan barcodes and encoded the data in the exif header on the jpeg, then I wrote software that pulled it and inserted all the pics into the database correctly. It was very slick, but the camera hasn't been updated and it's only 5 mp and just doesn't take the quality of pic I need these days.

So I looked the planet over for a camera that could either read barcodes or otherwise easily encode each pic so I can have the software put them all on the right items. I found one finally, and it's really a good camera overall: The Samsung Galaxy Camera, model G2000. It's basically an android phone without the phone but a great camera. So you can write apps for it, and I wrote an app that lets us put in the inventory number and it then renames the pics as I take them. Has a few minor bugs in it which are fixable if I get some time, but that part overall is fine.

I tell all of that though so you'll understand that I'm quasi-locked into the camera I use. Anything I use really needs to address the inventory issues, no way we can hand assign that many pics to items after the fact.

And it does take a good picture, it's something like 20MP, but they tend to be darker than I'd like. We've got some diffuser lights, the portable ones on stands you can buy, and that can help, but it seems to be a constant fight between being too dark and having glare. What I think I need is a better studio. I have one person who knows photography really well and she can expert set the focal length etc/ and does pretty well, but most of us need more point and click. I keep hoping if I can get the lighting right then the point and click will be better quality and the images wont' need as much post-production work to be brightened and adjusted. My photo person thinks the camera is pretty good, but certainly not pro level SLR (or whatever the acronym is), so I'm looking for ways to make it better and easier by changing what I can change.

I also have issues with taking very tight shots, the macro mode only lets us get so close, and again I have lighting/darkness issues with that setup.

I'm wondering if it wouldn't work better with the LEDs then reflected on a surface, b/c when we have more natural light coming in things do seem to do better.

[Darrell KSR]

I don't want to hijack, but I think Darrell's OP was well covered, so I'll leave it on this thread.
.

It was very well covered. Good discussion, enjoyable reading on the matter, too.

[PedroDaGr8]

So I looked the planet over for a camera that could either read barcodes or otherwise easily encode each pic so I can have the software put them all on the right items. I found one finally, and it's really a good camera overall: The Samsung Galaxy Camera, model G2000. It's basically an android phone without the phone but a great camera. So you can write apps for it, and I wrote an app that lets us put in the inventory number and it then renames the pics as I take them. Has a few minor bugs in it which are fixable if I get some time, but that part overall is fine.

Yep, I remember when you were camera hunting. I'm the one who brought up that model line. It is a great design, especially for the work you are doing. The ability to program your own software is a killer feature for businesses I think.



And it does take a good picture, it's something like 20MP, but they tend to be darker than I'd like. We've got some diffuser lights, the portable ones on stands you can buy, and that can help, but it seems to be a constant fight between being too dark and having glare. What I think I need is a better studio. I have one person who knows photography really well and she can expert set the focal length etc/ and does pretty well, but most of us need more point and click. I keep hoping if I can get the lighting right then the point and click will be better quality and the images wont' need as much post-production work to be brightened and adjusted. My photo person thinks the camera is pretty good, but certainly not pro level SLR (or whatever the acronym is), so I'm looking for ways to make it better and easier by changing what I can change.

I also have issues with taking very tight shots, the macro mode only lets us get so close, and again I have lighting/darkness issues with that setup.

I'm wondering if it wouldn't work better with the LEDs then reflected on a surface, b/c when we have more natural light coming in things do seem to do better.


It definitely sounds like a lighting issue. For your case, as you know, you want to AVOID single point lighting sources. These single point non-diffuse light sources are what cause the most glare. In this case, I think your most ideal product is going to be the premade LED strips. They make high CRI LED strips, such as here (https://www.superbrightleds.com/moreinfo/led-strips-and-bars/high-cri-led-light-strip-16ft-5m-high-density-led-tape-light-with-36-smdsft,-1-chip-smd-led-2835-with-lc2-connector/2579/5721/?utm_source=googlebase&utm_medium=base&utm_content=NFLS-x600X2-24V-LC2&utm_campaign=GoogleBaseChild&gclid=Cj0KEQjw6vquBRCow62uo-_J_YYBEiQAMO6HipksrYJ4WMzJ2nTK2GB29LNJMu_fZx0uIjCq oLXVvdsaAgE68P8HAQ) or even higher CRI here (http://store.yujiintl.com/collections/high-cri-led-strips-ribbon/products/vtc-series-high-cri-led-ribbon-60-led-m-unit-5m-reel)

Yuji, despite being from China, is actually pretty well respected on some lighting forums. More importantly, their R9-R15 values are all >90. The R9-R15 are values that fall outside of the tests for CRI, by having EVERYTHING higher than 90, you know that you are getting VERY accurate color reproduction. This is important, of course, when photographing things for others to see.

Now as for the LED strips, they have some unique benefits that might be worth your while. First and foremost, they are cut-to-length. Meaning you cut them to the length you want. Literally with a pair of scissors. Need more light in an area, parallel two or more strips to increase output. They are flexible so they can follow curves. You then connect the LED to a regulated power supply of the proper voltage and they light up. You are done!

As for your situation, due to the fact they are comprised of many small emitting devices, it makes it much more easy to diffuse the light output. Allowing for much more uniform lighting and what not. You can use diffusing film, reflected lighting, etc. to diffuse the light out to the desired degree.


EDIT: I think in general, you need a small space where you can control the lighting properly and get the lighting locked in. That way reducing the variables and reducing your system back to point and shoot.

[CitizenBBN]

Pedro, you're right I'd forgotten that it was you who got me on the android cameras in the first place, my apologizes for not giving you due credit. It was a BIG BIG deal to me, a huge help. The app I wrote has a few issues, I can fix them if I can get some time, but it's still a 95% solution for us which is huge. it's been a good camera for us, and takes a good picture. The expert mode is really strong, it's just that it's more expert than most of the people I have taking pics. lol.

I like the idea of the led strips, I'll check it out. It's definitely all about diffusing the light, and I had no idea how hard that would be to do. the word "impossible" comes to mind. :)

Thanks for explaining about color reproduction, that's definitely an issue, and while I haven't really read up on the science of it all it just seemed intuitive to me from your posts above that the higher CRI might help the camera do it's job. It just doesn't seem to be able to get the white balance at times, and you can even change the exposure area separate from the focus area, but I think better and also higher CRI lighting might do the trick. Definitely worth the try.

The diffusers I have now we've all but stopped using, in part I think bc they are set up with florescents and and making everything blue. You can adjust most cameras to such things and they will adjust, but it's not really doing it well enough compared to just not using them.

I've also changed the backgrounds we use for smaller items to a neutral gray, that seems to have helped some as well.

Thanks again for the advice, esp. on the camera itself. I worry they'll stop making them as they dont' seem to have a huge market, and I'll spend the next 10 years buying them up on ebay and hoarding them. Part of the issue seems to be cost, but I'd think more businesses would take advantage of the powerful programming options. The Ricoh we used has a niche in inventory, and the rugged design works well where this camera is way too fragile and consumer end to send out into a rainy lot to take pictures. Even then they haven't updated the thing in 15 years, doesn't give me loads of hope for the galaxy cameras.

[CitizenBBN]

Pedro I'm looking at those links, and they have choices between daylight white and warm white. Which one would be better for the brightness / color rendering issue? I'd think daylight white but I'm just taking guesses on this camera stuff.

[PedroDaGr8]

Pedro, you're right I'd forgotten that it was you who got me on the android cameras in the first place, my apologizes for not giving you due credit. It was a BIG BIG deal to me, a huge help. The app I wrote has a few issues, I can fix them if I can get some time, but it's still a 95% solution for us which is huge. it's been a good camera for us, and takes a good picture. The expert mode is really strong, it's just that it's more expert than most of the people I have taking pics. lol.

I like the idea of the led strips, I'll check it out. It's definitely all about diffusing the light, and I had no idea how hard that would be to do. the word "impossible" comes to mind. :)

Thanks for explaining about color reproduction, that's definitely an issue, and while I haven't really read up on the science of it all it just seemed intuitive to me from your posts above that the higher CRI might help the camera do it's job. It just doesn't seem to be able to get the white balance at times, and you can even change the exposure area separate from the focus area, but I think better and also higher CRI lighting might do the trick. Definitely worth the try.

The diffusers I have now we've all but stopped using, in part I think bc they are set up with florescents and and making everything blue. You can adjust most cameras to such things and they will adjust, but it's not really doing it well enough compared to just not using them.

I've also changed the backgrounds we use for smaller items to a neutral gray, that seems to have helped some as well.

Thanks again for the advice, esp. on the camera itself. I worry they'll stop making them as they dont' seem to have a huge market, and I'll spend the next 10 years buying them up on ebay and hoarding them. Part of the issue seems to be cost, but I'd think more businesses would take advantage of the powerful programming options. The Ricoh we used has a niche in inventory, and the rugged design works well where this camera is way too fragile and consumer end to send out into a rainy lot to take pictures. Even then they haven't updated the thing in 15 years, doesn't give me loads of hope for the galaxy cameras.

Haha, no worries on that. I just hadn't heard anything more about it after our discussion so I am glad to hear that overall it is working out well for you. Honestly, I think in another 10 years, cell phone cameras will be high enough quality that you don't NEED a separate point and shoot camera. With so much research going into the optics of cellphones, there will reach a point where the optics are suitable quality to do your job without the need for a bulky camera. For example, my phone actually has AMAZING macro capability. I often use it to read the tiny text on ICs on circuit boards because it can actually zoom better than eyesight.


Pedro I'm looking at those links, and they have choices between daylight white and warm white. Which one would be better for the brightness / color rendering issue? I'd think daylight white but I'm just taking guesses on this camera stuff.

I think natural white to daylight white (you want something around 3500K-5000K in Correlated Color Temp (CCT), this will be the most natural looking). You certainly don't want to drop below 3200K or go above 5500K. Yuji has another strip that is a bit more expensive here (http://store.yujiintl.com/collections/vtc-series/products/high-cri-led-ribbon-60-led-m-95-98-cri?variant=808351017). It also has a higher light output and has a wider range of color selections including 4000K which I think is the color you want. It should be a very pure white, without much blue tinge. Honesty, at 800/1000 lumens per meter, you are looking at at LOT of light (4000-5000 lumens). To give a comparison, a car headlight puts out around ~700 lumens for low beams and ~1000-1200 for high beams, albeit collected and directed in a very tight amount of space. A better comparison might be a 100W incandescent bulb, which can put out around 1200lumens, so this would would output right around the same amount of light as FOUR 100W incandescent bulbs.

EDIT: Honestly, I have read more about ultra HIGH CRI LEDs in the past two days than I ever thought existed. The Yuji LEDs are dramatically better quality than the ones from SuperBrightLEDs. Apparently, for photography, the R9-R15 values are VERY VERY important. One site I saw, was recommending trying to get LEDs that at least have a positive value for R9. The Yuji LEDs not only are positive, they are ALL over 90. This means that it should be VERY natural looking when you take photographs.