[Build] Lighting

[Brian Molnar]

So having finally gotten a chance to come up and see the new digs
tonight, I was curious to see what the plan was for lighting there.
Obviously with such a large space, rows of fluorescents seem to be
most practical, but I read on the wiki that there was interest in
tasking the large space as a disco as well. If this is the case, this
space would do well with a centralized/automated lighting system.

A popular approach, at least in theaters, is to use a DMX system which
allows for up to 512 separate channels on a single bus. This could
easily cover work lights, accent lights, and party lights for the
entire space, with enough room to set up logical blocks of channels
and allow for expansion.

The system is relatively cheap and easy to set-up. The control signal
is sent out from a single master to all the dimmer and relay units via
a single three-conductor wire (usually an XLR cable) that chains from
one unit to the next. The dimmers run about 60 dollars for a unit with
four channels capable of switching up to 15 Amps total. I have one
seuch dimmer pack that I could donate. And for the controller, I have
an RS-232 DMX controller, and basic controlling software I wrote, that
I could also donate.

The big benefits here are:

(a) Preset scenes can be programmed to provide lighting to particular
areas of the space, or to set-up lighting for specific events, like
projector use or meeting mode.

(b) If the large room is eventually used as a disco then setting up
party lighting is as simple as plugging in the extra lights and
writing a python/ruby/etc script to set-up a lighting program to have
them flash in patterns, randomly, or if you get more creative, you can
create scripts to control the lighting to respond to music.

(c) Intelligence could be added to the software to reduce
energy-consumption from unnecessary lighting, e.g. using a motion
sensor to determine if anyone is in a particular area of the space, or
automatically reducing the lighting output during the daytime hours
when light splashes in from the windows.

All-in-all the cost to convert the existing lighting could be quite
low and future expansions could be done as necessary.

Something to noodle on.

Cheers,
- Brian Molnar