Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Lighting behind the TV

here's an extract from a post in AVS forum by the owner of the company who makes the Ideal Lume:
"Our customers tend to be audiophile/videophile types and professionals, using the products for critical viewing and listening applications, including mastering. Such clients have included: NIST, ISF, THX Ltd., ILM, by deluxe, E-Film, CinRam, Deluxe Digital Studios, PostWorks, Electronic Arts, Radical Games, Zombie Studios, Factor 5, High Moon Studios, SlantSix Games, Universal Pictures, Joe Kane Productions, Microsoft Corp., Samsung Germany, Metropolitan Museum of Art- Video Production Lab, CNET Labs, About.com Labs, Image Entertainment, DisplayMate Technologies, Rev13 Films, Filet Post Production, Canadian Communications Research Center, Digital Film Lab- Copenhagen, Splice Here, etc."

The post can be read on this specific page:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=451527&page=38

Seems to me he has a vested interest in flogging these things. After all, Noel Lee convinced lots of recording studios to re-wire their facilities with Monster Cable.

Look, if you want a little light in the room, fine. I understand. I keep a small lamp on a dimmer in the corner of my room so I have just barely enough light to find the remote control. But to purchase a dedicated light for such purposes strikes me as absurd. And in the examples Club Neon posted, the best-looking image is the one with the lights off. In the bottom image, I find the venetian blinds and stuff below the TV to be distracting.

for anyone interested in knowing more about the subject, here's an informative piece:
http://www.cinemaquestinc.com/ive.htm

Read an interesting article in an Astronomy magazine the other day that pertains a bit to this. It was explaining how there is no definitive black or white. The color you see is a combination of the reflected light frequency verses the intensity of the background. Go to a strong enough extreme on the intensity of the background and white can appear black and vise-versa.

For example, the natural color of the surface of the moon is similar to a dark asphalt. However, when you see it in the sky, lit up by the powerful light from the sun against the black background of space, it can appear very white.

Another example is a sunspot. A sunspot is a cooler spot on the surface of the sun. Cool is a relative thing of course. At an average temperature of 3000–4500 K, you know damn well that a sunspot is going to be blindingly bright on it's own. However, when photographed against the 5700 K of the rest of the suns surface, they appear as black.

My cheap solution is a string of rope lights plugged into the switched AVR outlet, hidden behind a valence along the ceiling. It provides a nice even light washed on the wall and ceiling behind the TV.