Bias Lighting

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2011/11/bias-lighting.html

by AndrewDucker • 15 years ago

92 34 15 years ago

codinghorror.com

arnoooooo• 15 years ago

A dark room during the day is not very good for your health and mood.

tintin• 15 years ago

And people tend to be more productive in natural daylight.

Cushman• 15 years ago

Is this something people don't do? I can't stand using a computer if the room isn't bright enough to offset the screen. Although a lot of times I won't notice as it gets darker, and become more and more uncomfortable until I realize I need to turn on a light.

But I like complete darkness when watching movies-- a single light on in the other room drives me crazy. Any theories? Probably something to do with immersion.

invaders• 15 years ago

Strapping LEDs to the back of monitor? It's easier to just point ordinary desk lamp at the wall behind monitor.

icebraining• 15 years ago

Same. I use a flexible desk lamp (also from IKEA), which is really useful to regulate the type of light I want. For computer usage, I just point it at my white wall, which scatters it uniformly around the screen. For reading books, I can just twist it in my direction to get more light.

patrickk• 15 years ago

I do something similar. I have a led desk lamp with a clamp [1] on it, and point it at the wall behind my monitor.

[1] http://www.argos.ie/static/Product/partNumber/4328049/Trail/...

mixmastamyk3• 15 years ago

My favorite are xmas lights (or the white variation) around the workspace. Nice warm diffuse glow.

I also recommend the compiz negative plugin at night time.

joedogboi• 15 years ago

Personally, I can't stand working in a dark room. My partner, on the other hand, prefers it very dark in every room. I suspect he grew up in a house where the electricity bill was monitored very closely every month.

mixmastamyk3• 15 years ago

It's more natural, at night at least. I suspect you wouldn't have gotten as much accomplished in another century.

mattdeboard• 15 years ago

Just cranked down my work LCD from 100% brightness to 20%. Much better.

mixmastamyk3• 15 years ago

My samsung is very bright, but luckily it has presets I can cycle thru... 100% during the day, 0% at night.

funkah2• 15 years ago

Um, I just put my computer in front of a window. I like watching the sun come up and go across the sky as the day goes on.

eliben• 15 years ago

And you stop coding the moment it gets dark?

funkah2• 15 years ago

No, more like around 2pm or so. I realize this doesn't work for everybody, but I wanted to point out that there is a solution to this issue which does not involve clamps or LEDs or anything of the sort.

I mean, the article has pictures of a computer monitor right next to a freaking window and it never even mentions natural light. It's just kind of silly.

patio11• 15 years ago

http://stereopsis.com/flux/ <-- It changed my life. (Automatically adjusts screen brightness/color/etc such that your circadian rhythms resemble that of a normal human being as opposed to someone who stares at an artificial sun for 16+ hours a day.)

OriginalSyn• 15 years ago

I found it tended to try and dim my screen while I'm in the middle of gaming and caused my whole system to slow to a crawl and would sometimes crash my computer completely.

Aloisius• 15 years ago

Agreed. F.lux is a fantastic piece of software.

janjan• 15 years ago

I had severe problems with flux under Ubuntu so I switched to redshift:

http://jonls.dk/redshift/

Everybody should try a program like this, during the night/evening it is so much better then the normal color configuration!

tptacek• 15 years ago

Pro-forma agree. In the past few years, the few nights I've had trouble sleeping all turned out to be nights I accidentally disabled Flux and didn't notice.

polshaw• 15 years ago

Knew this would come up. It actually changes the colour temperature, so that it more closely matches that of artificial light once the sun has gone down. It does take some getting used to, but theres no way i'd ever go back now. Turning my screen back to its 'normal' colour temperature of 6500K at night looks positively radioactive.

Set it to slow transition, then you really don't notice it. (FWIW i use 3700K at night). This along with the rear-based lighting from the article is so much better to look at.

jseliger• 15 years ago

I use the Antec lights described in the post; you can see a picture of them in the dark here: http://jseliger.com/2011/10/07/steve-jobs-passes-and-the-int... . They're a definite improvement but don't provide a huge amount of light. But it's enough to make a difference. Plus, they're really cheap, at $12 from Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Antec-Halo-LED-Bias-Lighting/dp/B0053B...

gtani• 15 years ago

- Redshift/flux

- those fancy windowshades with pinholes

- laptops with antiglare screens, dammit!

jcurbo• 15 years ago

To everyone mentioning redshift/flux; they are great (I use flux on every computer I have) but they do not solve the issue being raised here. Bias lighting keeps the light levels behind your screen (or whatever you are looking at) higher, so that your irises don't have to contract and expand nearly as often or as much. This leads to less eye strain. (http://www.cinemaquestinc.com/ideal_lume.htm seems like a good explanation, first hit on google)

Redshift/flux vary the color temperature of your monitors. This keeps your internal biological clock from thinking the sun is up at midnight because of a bright white high-color-temp monitor. (More info at http://stereopsis.com/flux/)

zerostar073• 15 years ago

Actually if the light is behind the screen, your iris will adapt to different levels every time you look towards any other direction than the screen. The best solution is to have constant level of ambient light all around you.

SkyMarshal• 15 years ago

I meant to upvote, and fat-fingered downvoted you, and greyed your post. Hope someone can correct my mistake (I fixed your karma on another post). Thanks for the clarification.

zerostar073• 15 years ago

I don't see any real science behind this "bias lighting" vs any kind of lighting. What problem is it supposed to solve? The eyestrain is caused by our eyes focusing and fixating for too long on the same distances. Look outside the window if you want to relax your ciliary muscle. You also want your center of vision to receive ample light and contrast so you can read easier. Ambient light should just be enough so you don't see glare around the screen.

lutorm2• 15 years ago

It has nothing todo with accommodation strain, it's an "exposure" problem. If you are looking at a bright screen in an otherwise dark room, your pupils will adapt to the average flux hitting your retina. But if most of your field of view is dark, with a bright screen in the middle, this will cause an uncomfortably high flux from that part of your field. With a more even lighting so that the brightness of the screen is close to the average illumination, this doesn't happen.

zerostar073• 15 years ago

That is true, but better served with ceiling lighting (more even flux in your field of view

dpark• 15 years ago

Eyestrain is also caused by staring at a bright light (your computer screen) and then at a dark area (anywhere else, if you're in a cave) repeatedly. This causes your pupils to do an expand/contract dance and results in your retinas getting blasted with unexpected light repeatedly.

Seriously, though, who actually wants to work in a cave? I sometimes feel like Atwood just plays up stereotypes to have something to write about.

Tashtego• 15 years ago

I have a set of these running along the back of my desk, and pointed towards the back wall:

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/50119351/

I pretty much leave them on 24/7. It's a nice amount of backlight for my monitor in the day and night. Unfortunately, my home office doesn't get much natural light so I'm thinking about getting a sun lamp as well for the day.

georgieporgie2• 15 years ago

Random light-related horror story:

Not long before developing a debilitating neck issue, I got moved away from my excellent desk where I sat near a window, with my back to it. I was quite happy.

After getting moved toward the middle of the room, sitting with the window to my side, I was miserable. After a few months, my neck issues started.

I've only recently realized that this was at least partly due to my astigmatism. My contacts didn't compensate for astigmatism, and without realizing it, I was craning my neck further forward over time. Having the bright light at my back gave a significant sharpening effect, thanks to the pupil constriction, and allowed me to work without eye strain for much longer.

Recently, I've gotten contacts which correct astigmatism. They don't correct precisely enough to come anywhere near the precision of my glasses, so I still experience eye strain and crane my neck. I'm now beginning to ponder Lasik, since it sounds like they're getting consistently better results out of it these days.

lutorm2• 15 years ago

Lasik might be improving, but as far as I understand, the "best corrected vision" is still inferior to glasses. This means that while you no longer need correction, your visual acuity is worse than what it was with glasses.

I'm curious what you mean when you say your contacts "don't correct precisely enough". Is this because the axis/cylinder combination you want doesn't exist or because the contacts move on your eye and screws up the correction?

I have a fair amount of problems with the latter (my cornea has some funny shape that has a tendency to twist the contacts), but I find that it varies a lot between contact brands. So if you didn't already, next time you renew your prescription, try getting trial pairs of different brands and wear them for a week to see if one fits you better.

georgieporgie2• 15 years ago

I haven't done any sort of rigorous investigation yet, but it seems like I'm reading more incidental stories of people being corrected well past 20/20.

As for the contacts, I believe that they just aren't available in fine enough increments to properly fix my astigmatism. I'm using the Acuvue Oasys for Astigmatism type, which have little, vertical ridges at the top and bottom. Every time you blink, it forces them into alignment. It is rather irritating, though. It took me a couple of weeks to get used to them, and if I go a few days with glasses then they irritate me again the next time I wear them.

Another option I haven't tried is regular contacts along with glasses which just correct the astigmatism. I haven't tried that yet, though my eye doctor was happy to write a separate prescription for that. I don't mind glasses too much while in front of the computer, I just hate them for every other part of life (gym, cycling, motorcycling, etc).

colanderman• 15 years ago

I must own the last LCD in the universe with a matte screen. The primary light source of my room is behind me and I never ever have glare problems. Every laptop these days seems to have a glossy screen on it for the purpose of high contrast. But either you're inside and you don't need that much contrast (i.e. you turn the brightness control down), or you're outside and you get glare. I can think of few cases where glossy screens are superior.

Bias Lighting

Related Stories