LED Accents behind TV?

[makryger]

i was walking through an IKEA the other day, and saw a very neat combination of a wall-mounted TV, with LED strip lighting behind the TV. Not only does it look cool, but apparently it is better for your eyes. (Here's one example on a website, although I probably would want a neutral white light: http://d114hh0cykhyb0.cloudfront.net/im ... b_tv_3.jpg)

Anyways, has anyone done this with their TV? If so, any thoughts on how one would sync the turning on of the TV with the turning on of the LED Strip?

[staknhalo]

It helps with perceived contrast of the content you're viewing too.

Dynamic back-lighting is cooler, it changes colors with whatever content is playing on your screen (either 1 main color or multiple colors; making it look like the image goes beyond your screen).

There was a project to use the Ras-Pi with XBMC as a dynamic backlighting device a while back, I just didn't keep up with it. You might wanna look into that (if it's still around). Here is the video of it:

lT9_RS_bN40

[.Nico]

It is very much alive, check this site: http://pibob.nadnerb.co.uk/

.Nico

[makryger]

On one hand, this is really awesome and would love to set this up...

On the other hand, it seems awfully complicated, and really I'm just looking for a single color led backlight to turn on when the tv is on... shouldn't be that hard, right?

[staknhalo]

Single colored back-lighting? This is the world of HTPCs - we can complicate anything:

http://biaslighting.blogspot.co.uk/

[barnabas1969]

Makryger,

If you want simple/cheap, then you could just buy a "smart" power strip. Smart power strips have a master outlet (connect this one to your TV) and slave outlets (connect one of these to the power supply for your LED strip). Then, when the TV turns on, the LED's will turn on.

[.Nico]

I suppose opening the TV and use a voltmeter to check for some volts when TV is switched on is not an option?

What about let your mediacenter switch on the LEDstrip? Waking it up from standby also switches on the LED strip? It shouldn't be that hard to find an unused power-connector in your mediacenter that can be used to switch on a relais. The relais can then be used to switch your LED strips.

.Nico

[.Nico]

Makryger,

If you want simple/cheap, then you could just buy a "smart" power strip. Smart power strips have a master outlet (connect this one to your TV) and slave outlets (connect one of these to the power supply for your LED strip). Then, when the TV turns on, the LED's will turn on.

Will this work when the TV is in standby mode?

.Nico

[barnabas1969]

Makryger,

If you want simple/cheap, then you could just buy a "smart" power strip. Smart power strips have a master outlet (connect this one to your TV) and slave outlets (connect one of these to the power supply for your LED strip). Then, when the TV turns on, the LED's will turn on.

Will this work when the TV is in standby mode?

.Nico

I have several of these smart power strips. They are connected to TV's. They definitely turn off the slave outlets when the TV goes in standby. Some smart power strips even have an adjustment on them so that you can control the amount of current required to be drawn from the master outlet in order to trigger the slave outlets to turn on.

[.Nico]

Makryger,

If you want simple/cheap, then you could just buy a "smart" power strip. Smart power strips have a master outlet (connect this one to your TV) and slave outlets (connect one of these to the power supply for your LED strip). Then, when the TV turns on, the LED's will turn on.

Will this work when the TV is in standby mode?

.Nico

I have several of these smart power strips. They are connected to TV's. They definitely turn off the slave outlets when the TV goes in standby. Some smart power strips even have an adjustment on them so that you can control the amount of current required to be drawn from the master outlet in order to trigger the slave outlets to turn on.

Wauw, I've never seen them here. Do you have a link? Maybe I can order one on a webshop...

.Nico

[makryger]

Both of those ideas are good... I'd rather have it related to the tv status, rather than the htpc status, as sometimes the htpc turns on to record a tv show, but I don't turn on the tv for that.

[.Nico]

Both of those ideas are good... I'd rather have it related to the tv status, rather than the htpc status, as sometimes the htpc turns on to record a tv show, but I don't turn on the tv for that.

yes, my option was before I knew about these smart power strips. I want one now...

[barnabas1969]

Wauw, I've never seen them here. Do you have a link? Maybe I can order one on a webshop...

I have had one of these for years:
http://www.provantage.com/bits-limited- ... TSL001.htm

I also have several of these:
http://www.frys.com/product/6175349?sou ... 7AodagQAGQ

However, those are both for 120 volts, using a plug for North/South America. I don't think that will work in the Netherlands.

[staknhalo]

They're just marketed as 'energy-saving' or 'smart' power strips/surge protectors. Each of my HTPCs and my main desktop have an 8-outlet version. I forget the brand atm; but mine consist 1 master outlet, 5 slave outlets, and 2 'always-on' outlets. Then there's a switch to turn on/off the energy saving feature -turning it into a smart or dumb surge protector. I think they cost me like $40 each about a year ago.

http://www.newegg.com/Surge-Suppressors ... ory/ID-535

[holidayboy]

Does the tv have a usb port mak?

They're usually off when the tv is in standby, can you power some led strip off that?

Or something like this (if you have some free time!): http://m.techradar.com/news/digital-hom ... ing-616397

[richard1980]

I'm not really sure why anybody would want to go with multi-colored bias lighting. Some people might think multi-colored bias lighting looks cool (and I agree, it certainly does), but it's not correct, and more importantly, it defeats the purpose of using bias lighting in the first place. The correct way to implement bias lighting is to use a bulb that produces light as close as possible to the D65 white point, place it behind the display so that viewers can only see reflected light, and then set the bulb brightness so that the reflected light is no brighter than 10% of the whitest white the display is calibrated to reproduce (of course, this means the display needs to be properly calibrated for dark-room viewing, which will result in the color temperature settings on the TV being adjusted to get as close as possible to the D65 standard.) By doing this, you can effectively control the minimum amount of light that will enter the viewer's eyes, thus reducing the range of motion of the iris muscles during dark scenes, thus reducing eye fatigue. Additionally, using proper bias lighting ensures that on-screen colors are perceived correctly. Neither of those goals can be accomplished by using multi-colored bias lighting because the eye is more sensitive to certain wavelengths of light than it is to other wavelengths of light. So as the color and brightness of the bias light changes, the iris muscles are continuously working to adjust the amount of light that is allowed to enter the eye, which not only defeats the purpose of limiting the amount of work the iris muscles have to do, but also changes the perception of on-screen colors.

[barnabas1969]

I'm not really sure why anybody would want to go with multi-colored bias lighting. Some people might think multi-colored bias lighting looks cool (and I agree, it certainly does), but it's not correct, and more importantly, it defeats the purpose of using bias lighting in the first place. The correct way to implement bias lighting is to use a bulb that produces light as close as possible to the D65 white point, place it behind the display so that viewers can only see reflected light, and then set the bulb brightness so that the reflected light is no brighter than 10% of the whitest white the display is calibrated to reproduce (of course, this means the display needs to be properly calibrated for dark-room viewing, which will result in the color temperature settings on the TV being adjusted to get as close as possible to the D65 standard.) By doing this, you can effectively control the minimum amount of light that will enter the viewer's eyes, thus reducing the range of motion of the iris muscles during dark scenes, thus reducing eye fatigue. Additionally, using proper bias lighting ensures that on-screen colors are perceived correctly. Neither of those goals can be accomplished by using multi-colored bias lighting because the eye is more sensitive to certain wavelengths of light than it is to other wavelengths of light. So as the color and brightness of the bias light changes, the iris muscles are continuously working to adjust the amount of light that is allowed to enter the eye, which not only defeats the purpose of limiting the amount of work the iris muscles have to do, but also changes the perception of on-screen colors.

I think that's supposed to be 10% less than the brightest white.

[staknhalo]

Already provided him a link with all that info above; just the guy settled on some aquarium florescent lighting instead of LEDs, cause it was closer to 6500k and inexpensive or something - been a while since I read it.

[richard1980]

I think that's supposed to be 10% less than the brightest white.

No, it's 10% of the brightest white. I can't find a free copy of the SMPTE recommendation or I'd post the link. However, you can Google "SMPTE bias light" and get the info from 3rd parties. Or you can just look at some bias lighting calibration patterns...you'll see that the patterns certainly aren't at the 90% level.

Besides, have you ever tried to use the 90% level? That would be torture on your eyes.

[makryger]

The example i link i posted was red... but i really just want a white led- no multicolored. (Although that synchronized led with the movie looks amazing...)