Philips Hue WiFi lighting set up - what do you have?

Graham

300 lumen for the go, it's a bright little thing. :cool:

AndyBoBandy

Optimus Prime wrote: »

Cool, so if you wanted something to shine on a wall, regardless of the price, then you would be better of going for the iris as it would "light up" more of the wall?

well, yes and no I'd say,

the shape of the bloom means the light only goes one direction, with the Iris, it looks like a lot of light goes on the wall (same as bloom), but some light goes through the body of the light itself, to all directions.

Optimus Prime

Stoner wrote: »

120 isn't much in all fairness.

So these are decorative. A full colour Hue regular lamp could possibly be added to a third party lamp to create a similar-ish effect?

That's a good idea actually.

AndyBoBandy

Stoner wrote: »

120 isn't much in all fairness.

So these are decorative. A full colour Hue regular lamp could possibly be added to a third party lamp to create a similar-ish effect?

not much light at all, but as I said, mine is behind my TV, working in conjunction with 2 full colour hue's in bedside lamps, and when I turn off the bedside lamps, I'll leave the bloom on low behind the TV so as not to have the room only getting light from the TV, as depending on what your watching, it could be lots of flashes etc...

I'll try and take a few pics tonight of the bloom set up.

you could just use a regular bulb to do this, yes, even a GU10, but the bloom is quite small (a lot smaller than I ever thought it was going to be). and it works out about the same price as a bulb alone, so you'd still need the right lamp to hold it, which is more money, though with a regular bulb, you get more lumens, as well as the possibility to use it elsewhere if you didn't want the bloom effect anymore.

The only reason I bought it was I was there in Woodies, and they had them on the shelf, and me being me, said feck it, I might as well get one.

Stoner

AndyBoBandy wrote:

The only reason I bought it was I was there in Woodies, and they had them on the shelf, and me being me, said feck it, I might as well get one.

Understand, but you could get the effect if tbe GO from a regular Hue bulb in a lamp, with more lumens too. Dim it down if you like.

Optimus Prime

Im always worried about leaving lamps plugged in all the time if I did just use a hue bulb in one instead of a bloom\iris. I might get a bloom and see what its like, it wont go to waste anyways. I want to pick up a couple of the elgato eve plugs too though and one of the hue sensors to play with.

AndyBoBandy

Stoner wrote: »

Understand, but you could get the effect if tbe GO from a regular Hue bulb in a lamp, with more lumens too. Dim it down if you like.

I still like the idea though of having a big hue set up comprising some of the various different lights they offer,

I now have 6 colour, 3 Lux & 8 White bulbs, as well as the 2 lightstrips with extensions, and the bloom. I've also 4 GU10 colour & 4 GU10 white ambiance bulbs in the post, with 6 more colours to soon follow.

I'm sure somewhere down the line I'll get an Iris and maybe a GO!!

(that 50 lights per bridge limit, I'm seeing it as a target now!!)

Graham

Did you look at the Philips Hue Phoenix/Beyond/Being yet?

matrim

Stoner wrote: »

Guys has anyone got the Hue bloom.

It's pricey but I'm thinking of adding it to my place.
I was thinking of the equipment cabinet beside my TV to backwash the wall.

I'll hook it up to the ring doorbell to flash the the door rings and to the nest smoke detector and co2 detector .

I think it could have useful applications

But how does it look? Im not one for dimming and colour change because it's caused me so much hassle over the years at work. However this seems to have nailed it.

Has anyone got one. How do they use it. Is it something you got and played with it for a while but now you never change the colour etc?
Could be cool for story time for the kids ?

I was thinking of something like that except for the bus in the morning. Have a script to scan the RTPI info between 8.30 and 9. If it says a bus is 10 minutes away it should change to blue and if it says a bus is 5 minutes away change to red.

AndyBoBandy

Graham wrote: »

Did you look at the Philips Hue Phoenix/Beyond/Being yet?

Wouldn't need a Phoenix as I already have the downlights installed (kitchen, landing & attic), so only need to install the GU10 Hue bulbs,

as for the beyond & being, I already have my lamps/light fittings, so they wouldn't really be needed (and the missus would go mental) - but this for me is the whole idea of Hue, you can still have all your own lamps/shades etc, with the functionality of the bulbs/app to play around with. If everyone just had the being style lights, they'd all be the same, and all be bland.

I've got some stunning table lamps (my mother keeps buying me these big awesome lamps), and I love them, I love hue bulbs in them, if they were just white bland Philips lights, I probably wouldn't love them.

Stoner

Optimus Prime wrote:

Im always worried about leaving lamps plugged in all the time if I did just use a hue bulb in one instead of a bloom\iris. I might get a bloom and see what its like, it wont go to waste anyways. I want to pick up a couple of the elgato eve plugs too though and one of the hue sensors to play with.

That happens a lot on commercial buildings with some Dali dimming solutions. All the lights on standby but the dimming control loop set to zero while off. You still have a few watts in each fitting, vampire loads . One solution is high frequency switching of the ballasts . I'd imagine that the Philips lamps and lights have something similar , each lamp is powered with some sort of electronics on standby so I'd say that once it's a Hue product that the power will be at the fitting 24/7 and drawing some power as it listens for its next command.

AndyBoBandy

Here's the bloom in action;

2 on its own, and 2 with the bedside lights also on the same colour.

The bright spot you see in the photo is the focal point of the light, and only really noticeable in photos.

Stoner

Stoner wrote:

Yes you need 16v to 24v transformer but we use 12v here and 12 with on the standard one

Very nice thanks for the effort

OU812

Just wondering if anyone has a Philips TV with ambilight? Apparently it works with hue. Might be upgrading TV and might go for one if it does.

Optimus Prime

AndyBoBandy wrote: »

Here's the bloom in action;

2 on its own, and 2 with the bedside lights also on the same colour.

The bright spot you see in the photo is the focal point of the light, and only really noticeable in photos.

Looks cool it's fairly decent lighting up the wall. It's just behind the tv is it ?

Stoner

Stoner wrote:

Do you need a Philips TV to get them to work with the TV, would be more value again I think. The Humminizer thing.

OU812 wrote:

Just wondering if anyone has a Philips TV with ambilight? Apparently it works with hue. Might be upgrading TV and might go for one if it does.

I was wondering about that above. I thought I read something about a bit if universal kit for this, I have attempted , possibly incorrectly to recollect it as a Humminizer

AndyBoBandy

Optimus Prime wrote: »

Looks cool it's fairly decent lighting up the wall. It's just behind the tv is it ?

Yes, I have it hanging from the TV bracket with cable ties, I had it resting on the sky box, but it projected the lines and shapes of the tv bracket onto the ceiling, which didn't look great, so where it is now, I get a cleaner light on the ceiling.

AndyBoBandy

And here she is;

AndyBoBandy

OU812 wrote: »

Just wondering if anyone has a Philips TV with ambilight? Apparently it works with hue. Might be upgrading TV and might go for one if it does.

I don't have a Philips TV, but I did get a pretty cool (free) app the other day "Sync My Lights" which allows you to create recipes for watching movies, or select some already made recipes for particular movies. the list of movies isn't massive, but last night I watched The Dark Knight with it's associated light recipe, and it is actually very good. the lights change with scenes in the movie, i.e. indoors to outdoors brightens up the lights, something bad/evil happens, and they went red, the movie went dark, the lights went dark, big explosion onscreen, a big orange flash of the lights..

there were a few sync issues (it says play the app scene at the same time as the movie starts playing, however it always seemed to be a second behind the movie, so I'd pause for a second to let it catch up, there is also a listening auto sync function (I guess similar to Shazam) that supposedly syncs the lighting scene to the movie, but again, seemed to always be a second off)

I can definitely see potential in this app, if they get dedicated users to make up more scenes for movies, and tweak their sync issues, it could end up being a brilliant hue app.

will watch Ant Man or The Avengers with it tonight I think!!

J.pilkington

Some advice to all, hold out if you can until Black Friday, Amazon always have a few hue items at good prices

AndyBoBandy

When does Black Friday usually occur? I've never partaken in it before

edit.

Friday November 25th

J.pilkington

AndyBoBandy wrote: »

When does Black Friday usually occur? I've never partaken in it before

edit.

Friday November 25th

It works by Amazon releasing a limited number of product types every 15 mins or so at reduced prices. You can see what is upcoming for the day (and filter by lighting products) so you need to be quick and pounce when deal comes live. Example of prices would be an iris which I got last year for £47

Advice would be to sign up to Amazon prime close to the time (1st 30days free) and you get early access to the deals

bk

I have two Blooms as bedside lamps. They add enough light to read comfortably by, without being too disturbing to another person sleeping. In particular if you use red.

I've an Iris in the babies bedroom, which is mostly used as a fancy night light. Again mostly use red. Yes, the Iris is much brighter then the bloom, but actually probably too bright for what we are using it as. We normally have it at it's dimmest setting.

I've an Aura behind the TV in the living room to add a splash of colour behind the TV. It doesn't change to what is on the TV, or anything like that, I just find that it actually makes it easier to watch the TV in an otherwise black room and improves TV viewing.

I never planned to buy all of these, I just sort of bought them gradually over the years via various Amazon sales!

paulbok

bk wrote: »

I have two Blooms as bedside lamps. They add enough light to read comfortably by, without being too disturbing to another person sleeping. In particular if you use red.

I've an Iris in the babies bedroom, which is mostly used as a fancy night light. Again mostly use red. Yes, the Iris is much brighter then the bloom, but actually probably too bright for what we are using it as. We normally have it at it's dimmest setting.

I've an Aura behind the TV in the living room to add a splash of colour behind the TV. It doesn't change to what is on the TV, or anything like that, I just find that it actually makes it easier to watch the TV in an otherwise black room and improves TV viewing.

I never planned to buy all of these, I just sort of bought them gradually over the years via various Amazon sales!

None of us ever did, now it's an addiction

alancostello

OU812 wrote: »

Just wondering if anyone has a Philips TV with ambilight? Apparently it works with hue. Might be upgrading TV and might go for one if it does.

I do, and I use the Ambilight+Hue app, though I don't use it particularly often, it is a cool effect however(it just drains the battery life of the device as it does all the calculations/commands to the bulbs). I'd put it on for movies mostly! Apparently some of the newer Android based Philips TVs have the app built in? I'm not aware of any current Philips TV stockists in Ireland though so you might have to go through the UK.

alancostello

Here's my bedroom setup.

Three e27 Colour bulbs(bedside, end of bed, ceiling), two Lightstrip Plus, one in each bookcase(with some CAT5 soldering between the two sides), and a 42" wall mounted Ambilight TV.

Stoner

We'd need to pin bargain alerts associated with home automation too imo. I miss all these sales

OU812

Wonder if Hue will launch something like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMbmlqLk740

Graham

OU812 wrote: »

Wonder if Hue will launch something like this:

That's the Christmas tree lights sorted :mad:

AndyBoBandy

My 4 White & Colour Ambiance GU10's arrived just now along with the motion sensor - Happy Days

I had to remove the 12v transformers from 4 of my kitchen spots as well as change from GU4 to GU10 fittings, but alas, it only took 10 minutes and their all in!!

I'm up to 24 hue lights now!!

No doubt I'll have the remaining 6 I need ordered by the end of the day!!