fotoobscura

Oh my god I just lost an entire huge post because I tried to upload a word doc and when it said I couldn't I went back and the entire thing was gone.. will have to reply later..ugh

I'm sorry what I thought about fluorescents were that they would be fluorescent "type" bulbs but small like regular lamps..perhaps they don't exist? They need to fit in a small ball that is 45mm in diameter. I was thinking, perhaps naively, that I could fit a bright light and a battery inside such a small enclosure. Is this perhaps inaccurate? I am not wholly comfortable with my electrical skills to float (accurate, by the way) these balls through a constant source of electricity from one shore to another. I suppose it would save me a whole lot of individual batteries but I was envisioning a battery, resister, bulb/led/of some sort in each ball and then separated by a thin filament wire x distance. Something like that, i'm still solidifying the idea. Primarily based on what you folks say :) If I haven't already mentioned i'm talking about several thousand lights that *must* bob in and out of the water. Thanks!

P.S. to ED: You have some great points. All lights that are on will be turned off on the path by the city and will remain off all night. There will be a faint amber flow from the rear of the viewing area but for the most part it will be dark. Of course providing there is a full moon which in case will cause a big, big problem :) So i'll be checking the phase of the moon in a few minutes for that date :) Alex

Thank all of you VERY much! So fluorescent sounds the right way to go! Perhaps white fluorescent bulbs with a regulator and a battery on a tiny board? I'd like to either use white or blue...Price is not a concern, but time is..sort of (entire project which contains much more than the electronic part) needs to be done by August at the latest. What sort of bulbs am I looking at for brightness? This circuit will need to fit into a 45mm plastic "ball" and will be permanently sealed after it is turned on. The distance is what i'm concerned about. I can do tests with various voltages and bulbs.. If its of any design significance I will have several *thousand* of these strung together (unknown so far the distance between each) so perhaps others that mentioned the led's wouldn't be bright would be actually bright enough as result of the sheer amount of led's in the water. Thanks again ...the response in 8 hours was amazing! Alex

Hi. I am building a large nighttime art project on the waterfront where I live in Burlington, VT. It requires very, very bright led's encapsulated inside waterproofed plastic bubbles. The distance from the viewer to the bubbles will be at the very most 300m but perhaps more. The brighter the better. I am wondering what sort of circuit I will have to build for this. The bubbles will have to be fabricated beforehand and as such the battery + led will have to remain on for some weeks. I am under the impression that blue led's are either a) nonexistent or b) hard to find. I am looking to use blue led's preferably because I am under the impression that blue is the most sensitive color to the eye and as such will travel further and design this piece of art better. I prefer not to use red but white led's (lightbulbs?) :) are fine if blue or violet are nonexistent or too expensive, etc. I know my soldering and can build very, very basic circuits but cannot read schematics too well. I can learn, of course. My initial thought was to basically solder a battery to an LED but i'm sure thats just way too easy for it to work :) Thanks for all advice, tips, etc.