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Would You Be Interested in a Design Challenge on Sensor Integration in Lighting?

rscasny

I spend a good amount of my week in meetings with our suppliers. We talk about what activities that they can bring to element14. And I do a lot of listening about what interests them and try to match it up with what I think its the element14 community. The results of the discussions often bring sponsored activities in the Design Challenge, Roadtest, and Essentials areas of the community, among others. 

One area of interest for our suppliers is lighting. This can include street lighting, indoor lighting and outside lighting. I think the migration from incandescent or fluorescent lighting to LED lighting is one example of their interest. )I hear about Horticulture Lighting more than you think!) They see the benefit of energy savings, while I would say you can do a lot of things with LED lighting. Some of our suppliers are putting out dev kits. So, it's an area of substantial interest.

Currently, I am speaking with a supplier who is interested in sensor integration in lighting. I suppose this phrase can mean various things. For me, it means two things: (1) the ability to run the sensor data output through the lighting system and (2) the ability to have the sensors control the state of the LED in an office or building. It could be something as simple as temp sensors or object detection/human presence sensors that would turn the lights off when no one was in a room for a designated period of time. Of course, there are many other applications or ways one can play with LED lighting. 

I'm trying to get your feedback on your interest in participating in an sensor lighting integration challenge? If you aren't, that's fine. If you are, what would you need, materials-wise.  I'm guessing the materials could include a control board, LED Driver, LEDs, Sensors, Connectors, LED fixtures, etc. 

  • in reply to dougw

    "...Since cats can't figure out how to turn lights on themselves..."

    To be fair, having the switch located halfway up the wall and in a rather paw-unfriendly physical format probably doesn't really help here though.

    I suspect if you had something at ground level and in a more paw compatible format, then you could teach them. Whether they would use it or not for their benefit by preference as opposed to a fun play toy or just to get a reward is an interesting question though.

    However, good luck with getting them to turn it off after use. It is hard enough to get humans to do that, unless they have to pay the electricity bill.

  • in reply to robogary

    A long time ago I was reading about a project that used the TAOS TCS230 colour sensor as part of a low cost colorimeter for home cinema colour calibration. The project website still remains:

    https://www.homecinema-fr.com/colorimetre-hcfr/hcfr-colormeter/

    It appeared to do surprisingly well against some of the more expensive off-the-shelf products. At the time TAOS provided a lot of useful information and tools focused around calibrating the sensor.

    I recall AMS took over from TAOS out and the TCS2300 replaced the TCS230 and then there later there was the TCS34725 which started to appear in Adafruit / Grove product lines aimed at makers. Some of them had rather convenient M12 S-Mount lens holders on them which with the right focal length allowed for spot metering type applications.

    I recall a number of users complaining about the colour accuracy but it appeared that they hadn't attempted to calibrate the sensor values in any way and were just taking the raw RGB values and passing them on to Neopixel LEDs and expecting  a perfect match.

  • in reply to Gough Lui

    "...Colour temperature changing would be interesting too, but I wonder how well that would be implemented..."

    This is often an issue when working with video cameras in rooms where mixed colour temperatures and levels are an issue when panning the camera around a room. Often in a meeting or seminar rooms you can end up with a mixture of tungsten, fluorescent, LED and daylight (oh and don't forget the projector / LCD screen light source too) all at different colour temperatures and brightness levels. Would be nice for light sources to play nicely together. Not only does it help the camera but it also can reduce eye-strain.

  • in reply to beacon_dave

    Theoretically there is an off-chance that you might possibly be able to teach a cat something that they will remember for 3 minutes, but it would take less time and effort to design an AI system that does it for them. Slight smile

  • in reply to dougw
    dougw said:
    when it senses a cat

    Oh! This just got interesting! 

  • in reply to beacon_dave
    beacon_dave said:
    then you could teach them

    More than likely the cat will then sit by the switch meowing loudly for you to come turn it on for them Laughing

  • in reply to dougw

    Well, there are a lot of cat videos ....

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osDbBZYMHIk

  • in reply to ntewinkel

    Yes, why learn something when you can just train a human to do it for you?

  • I would need materials that I cannot source on my end. SO if this challenge is helping me in that area then I am in. My design is on the lines of regulating energy in my Building which is divided into disntict parts with distinct functions like living, work, Kitchen and Frontal. ANd the new addtion is the terrace where my mini garden is situted with my water storage unit. I believe this sensor integration in lighting might just be the thing thzt could be of asset to my current project.