New light just for fun

Hoppy said:

That is very impressive, the way it makes all of the fish colors stand out. I like the effect of the cyan on the rocks too. Do you have a DIY forum thread about how this is built?

Click to expand...

Err.. no because it breaks almost every "rule".. so I don't encourage it..
Here is the rough framing w/ the 3W stars..


This is the wiring pattern:


One thing I did want to try was to angle each strip (except the center).. into a parabolic shape.. Threw that out for now when I combined (for mass heat exchange) the outer 2 bars.. (in a sense I built arse backwards. )
I made the mistake of going cheap on the outer bars when in fact they were actually the "main light" so to speak.. so I joined them w/ the inner bars using screw and "heatsink plaster"..

Then I was just going to angle just the joined bars, but having a 40B I decided it wasn't worth the effort and I'd see how it "looks" first..
I've got to build a "shade" for it yet so I can recoup the outer wide light via reflector..

Oh and no optics, I wanted a flood to eliminate any disco, which except for the overdriven cyan, worked pretty well. Oddly every once in awhile there are color spots.. like a snail shell going bright red due to catching a "color" .. It is kind of odd..

anyways I only build to please myself mainly..
stars were attached using 2-56 steel screws (all I could get immediately, I'd have preferred stain. steel). Contemplated bigger.. 4-40's but they seemed too big, at least in steel.. Nylon would have been fine at that size (or smaller and actually had a larger head IF you got the right ones).I may switch yet now that I know the heating isn't too bad.. I believe nylon can take up to 135F..

Not knowing how much the heat buildup would be I didn't use 2-56 nylon for fear of stretching or melting. I only used heat sink compound on the stars (no real holding power) .
Each channel is in series ( I have a big PS) so no messing w/ series/parallel)

Only other thing to note is the royal blue channel has whites interspersed just to add more white to a channel I'd probably never run on its own..
Red I run alone for sunrise and sunset..cyan was separate "just because"...
Outer ring of white is ww..w..ww..w.. ect..

One fun thing.. (and a plug for O2surpluses "Typhon sketch' who gets a public thanks here) and unrelated to anything is his sketch ramps up each channel and in sequence.. I had red 1.. rb/w 2, ww,w 3 and cyan 4..
On ramp up the lights went from deep red, purple,pink, blue white, green white..Gave me a good idea of possible color temps and color tints possible.. also testing it on that "cushion" you see gave me an insight into CRI..
since the pastels would change as each "color" came on line.. I know I amuse easily...
Lights on test frame.. need to clean up wiring a bit..


OH one last thing.. except for a bit of exposure I try to keep my photos as accurate as I see them visually.. It is not always easy.. but I try.. due to trying for fast speeds at low iso's my photos are "underexposed" and boosted but no color tweaking and very limited contrast adj.. WB is set to daylight or cloudy..

to judge color for yourself.. substrate is red granite/ flourite mix and white quartz pebbles from our local river.. Rocks are solid white quartz

Oh Hoppy.. thanks for asking...........

sunset in guppyville...
starting (cyan and "blue" channel already ramped off..)

a bit later as the whites ramp down.....