Hello folks,
I have a bunch of COB LED emitters that I want to attach to my ceiling and have light shine down. Most likely it will be done in a ghetto manner. I just started reading about diffusers and wanted to make sure that I get the "right" kind that doesn't waste light. For example, I read that milky colored diffusers are wasteful because they absorb too much light, while "light shaping diffusers" are the right kind to get.
What I have right now is two 4ft t8 fluorescent tubes on the ceiling, spaced about 4 ft apart. Above each tube, I put a 6 inch wide strip of clear plastic film, but spray-painted white, so it mostly reflects, but still transmits a little bit so the ceiling above the lights isn't dark. It works ok in that it gives relatively soft shadows. So I would like something as good or better. I plan to take the LEDs and space them from one to a few feet apart, depending on their brightness and how much of the room I want to light up. What would be a good and not too expensive film or other shape to use?
For example, Tap plastics has some matte / frosty / crackled panels, but I don't know how good they are at spreading light.
http://www.tapplastics.com/product_info/plastics_information/light_panels
There's the Inventables films, which at least have specs:
https://www.inventables.com/categories/materials/light-diffusers
Then I guess there are the official "light shaping diffusers", although I didn't find an easily available source for them.
Even Ikea has cloth lamp shades for cheap, but I don't know how much light they lose.
One idea I had was to simply mount a few LEDs on an aluminum channel, and then take some diffusing film and roll it around.
At minimum, I want to avoid obvious multiple shadows, and it had better not burn my eyes to look directly at the fixture.
Any suggestions?
Thanks
PS: Also, it shouldn't mess up the CRI of my lighting
I have a bunch of COB LED emitters that I want to attach to my ceiling and have light shine down. Most likely it will be done in a ghetto manner. I just started reading about diffusers and wanted to make sure that I get the "right" kind that doesn't waste light. For example, I read that milky colored diffusers are wasteful because they absorb too much light, while "light shaping diffusers" are the right kind to get.
What I have right now is two 4ft t8 fluorescent tubes on the ceiling, spaced about 4 ft apart. Above each tube, I put a 6 inch wide strip of clear plastic film, but spray-painted white, so it mostly reflects, but still transmits a little bit so the ceiling above the lights isn't dark. It works ok in that it gives relatively soft shadows. So I would like something as good or better. I plan to take the LEDs and space them from one to a few feet apart, depending on their brightness and how much of the room I want to light up. What would be a good and not too expensive film or other shape to use?
For example, Tap plastics has some matte / frosty / crackled panels, but I don't know how good they are at spreading light.
http://www.tapplastics.com/product_info/plastics_information/light_panels
There's the Inventables films, which at least have specs:
https://www.inventables.com/categories/materials/light-diffusers
Then I guess there are the official "light shaping diffusers", although I didn't find an easily available source for them.
Even Ikea has cloth lamp shades for cheap, but I don't know how much light they lose.
One idea I had was to simply mount a few LEDs on an aluminum channel, and then take some diffusing film and roll it around.
At minimum, I want to avoid obvious multiple shadows, and it had better not burn my eyes to look directly at the fixture.
Any suggestions?
Thanks
PS: Also, it shouldn't mess up the CRI of my lighting
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