simple setup for a nightlight

Hello all I am new here posting, but have been lurking a while.

I had a thought for trying to make what I thought was a fairly simple thing. Gads so this sort of started as a simple thought. I am not an engineer, but I can solder sort of.

I am looking for ideas on how to get a few features into a light source.

I have a 2 year old who sleeps in the same room with us, so don't really want to turn on the lights.

I was thinking of something that is a nightlight / navigation light.

It would have 1 RED LED as a night light.
It should have 3 to 4 white leds for use as a navigation light in the dark.
2 lights on or half low light white led mode for sort of an ambient light mode.

Full on for searching for the baby's toys.

It does not have to be totally small, but smaller is better.
It does not have to look like a flashlight too much, but needs to be able to stable and point up.

should run on 2-4 AA or AAA rechargable batteries for economy.

Should have a reasonably long runtime in ECONOMY modes.

I have a CMG Blaze that works ok, but it is kind of lacking in form and function. Can you say the button is cheesey!
I have a Petzel Zippka Plus headlight that is awsome for form and function, but could have a bit more economy and no RED light super economy mode.

Here is what I was thinking.

I was thinking of a project box or an etneralight housing like device.

The RED LED points up. There is a 3 positon switch that controls OFF, LOW and HIGH for the RED LED.

The white LEDs point forward and have a 3 position switch that controls
OFF, 2 LEDS and 4 LEDS.

Tritum vial or some kind of glow paint to help find the light in the dark. (Cool factor would be the Tritum.)
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Can anyone help me out here? I am looking for ideas of how to set this up a little better.

I wish I could get the controls for programming the light like some of the more expensive lights (lion heart, etc) that would give me controlable brightnesses. Like click once for ON, 2x click for 50% or 3x clicks for 75%... What do I have to do to get that kind of control drivers for the lights?

I know I can find the 3 button switchs, but would like to find some of the push buttons ("click") that could be used with the programmed controller above. Can someone help me out on this?

How about regulation to help give regulated power and some kind of indication of low batteries? Sort of like the ARC 1 xAAA "moon" mode, but a little better indication of battery replacement needed. I find that the "moon" mode makes me squint lots before I realize that I should be changing the batteries.

The pie in the sky setup would be I could get all this into a 1D sized M*G shape. With 1 button on the side and 1 button on the tail with all the features listed above. And the light would standup on the tail stable.

Me being practicle, I would say just the project box with all the features would be wonderful. But your help in any of these areas would be great.

Why not just get a $26 Ergo 3 eternaLight with the red/white LED option? With it's programmability, sounds like what you are looking for.

you could just mod a 4AA touchlight with LEDs. have one LED on constant on using about 2-5ma and the touchlight using 3-4 LEDs at 20-30ma each. I have a few touchlights that run for one minute per tap I adjusted one to run 15 mins so I can go to the bathroom late at night without waking myself all the way up.

I like the idea of the touchlight, and am considering it. It is high on my list of modifications to start.

lynx Arc, how did you set up the light to come on and stay on for 15 minutes? The "touch lights" you are talking about are the standard "touch lights" you can get at places like walmart right? I appologize if this sounds like a weird question, but there are a ton of new accronyms here that I have to be sure we are talking about the same thing...

Speaking of using the touchlight, if using some of the circuts that vary the power to the led, it would work too. 1 tap to get 100%, 2 taps to get 50%, etc depending on the driving circut, but where to get the driver circuts that will do this?

I am not at a loss on finding the circuts. Can you help there?

how about something really simple, the Timex indiglo nightlights that stay in a outlet, a couple in our house work great and provide plenty of light for nighttime navigation and in our house, we used them with little shades that block upward light migration and keep us ahhh in the dark in our bed, but still illuminate the floor. we also keep two of the cheap brinkmans 3 v xenon from walmart on our bedstands. along side our cellphones.

http://www.techass.com/el/derngr/index.php

The Eternalight Derringer has multiple output levels, 2 white LEDs and 1 red LED. $20.

Got to agree about the Derringer. Nice size and function.

Geoff

You might want to consider the Rigel Systems Skylite LED - 2 White, 2 Red. Infinite adjustable using a rotating wheel for either sets of LEDs. It uses a 9 volt battery but you can get them in rechargable in most stores.

If you decide to build something, how about using a logarithmic potentiometer to the control brightness of the white LED(s) instead of a three position switch?