Hi Guys
This is my first post, so be gentle!! I was planning on placing some infrared filter material in front of my mini maglite to make an infrared illuminator for a Sony camcorder with nightshot. Will this work? Is there anything I need to know? Do you have any other suggestions?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Woosty.

I don't know how much near-infrared energy the mini mag lite puts out to begin with. It might not be enough to make much of a difference. But try it out and let us know!

Doesn't an infrared filter take out infrared light?
My suggestion is to put a bunch of high intensity IR LEDs on a circuit board, that might work better.

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There are IR filters that pass only IR light (generally for special effects in photography, or using nightshot during the day) but they have a rather high loss. In addition to that, most light sources don't put out much IR energy. Jehan's suggestion is good -- IR LEDs emit a surprisingly good amount of light for their size. A few of them should light up a small room well. If you're not a do-it-yourself'er you can get them pre-made on eBay.

I was just thinking of doing the same thing. The only problem is that my camcorder (gs120) doesn't have a 'nightshot' feature that i know of. I can however 'see' the infrared light from remote controls, etc. Would i still be able to use IR LED's for illumination?

I was thinking of wiring up several IR LED's in a project box or something and then using that as a light.

I'm not looking to make anything professional, just something that will throw out a little bit of light and not burn out anyone's retinas when i'm filming in an almost pitch black room(e.g. concerts, parties).

I found some LED's that are made to be used as a source of illumination, and if no one has tried this i'll be reporting the results once i get it pieced together.

Thanks.

Here is an interesting article "A D.I.Y. Bright White LED Ringlight":
http://users.telenet.be/cisken/LED_..._ringlight.html


Rich

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thanks for the link, that will really help when i go to build the device.

But what i really wanted to know is will it work with my camera, even though it doesn't have "nightshot". I know that all ccd's can see IR light, but aren't they supposed to have filters that prevent that?

Surely someone has tried this.

Yes, it should work. If your camera can see the light form one LED, it can see the light from a dozen.

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Thanks, thats what my logic was, but i read that newer camcorders have IR filters and i thought it might counter the effectiveness of the light as a source of illumination.

I'll get some pics up once i get it finished, if anyone else is into tinkering with LED's and such.

I have both cameras with and without nightshot and notice that although the non-NS cameras pick up IR light, it seems much dimmer than a NS camera in NS mode. Your light should work, but you'll prolly need twice as much light as a camera with NS mode would need. If you haven't tried it already, try going in a dark room and aiming your remote at an object rather than the camera itself, and see how much effect one LED makes. This should give you an idea how many you need.

Now that my IR LED's finally came, the strength of the IR filter becomes apparent. Although i can see the light, the LED's appear scores dimmer than they did with my webcam and my digital camera. Obviously the light from 20 will be brighter than the light from 1, but we will have to wait to see exactly how much brighter.

In the Sony "Nightshot" when it is activated it removes the filter designed to block IR. That is why it works so well. I don't know if any other consumer camcorders do that, they usually have the IR blocking filter.


Rich

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i finished soldering the the LED's to the PCB, and sadly it doesn't work. The lights appear as a dim red, and don't do much in the way of illumination. Oh well. Now I know.

Thanks to everyone for the help.

Hi all,

I'm too. Thinking to get some IR LEDs to build my own IR illuminator for my GS-400. I have done some research on the web regarding the IR illumination spec. The result is not so simple what I thought; get some IR LEDs and build.

What I did was bought a camera with IR LEDs to try. This kind of IR cameras are easy to order from on-line. They have different type, it all depend on what you want. Mine is can illuminate up to 30fts as the manufacturer claimed.

I switched off my study room's light and switched on the IR camera. I can see good B/W image from the camera but I couldn't see anything on my GS-400!

I could see the IR LEDs emitted low 'red grow' light. I pointed the Gs-400 to the IR LEDs and nothing I could see except some red lights from LEDs. The cheap CMOS camera can 'see' the illumination from the IR LEDs.

According to the some conclusion I found on the web; (1) True IR LED, proberly above 800nm is the best. Some can go up to 1200nm. (2) A IR filter; filter other lights which belows 800nm.

I couldn't get the IR LED spec from my IR camera. Anyway, it only work on the CMOS camera.

I'll look for some 800 to 1000nm type IR to try again. Ya...proberly get a filter too.

Here is a link from a guy who reviewed some of the IR LEDs; http://ledmuseum.home.att.net/ledir.htm

Great thread all - lots of useful information.

I went down to the Sony Style store at South Coast Plaza and spoke with one of the sales people. This sales person assured me that if I buy a Sony HVL-IRM Infrared Light accessory I can improve the low light video for my Sony PC-1000. They didn't have a HVL-IRM at the store so I couldn't try it out.

Will visit another video store in my area to try this out. I'll report my findings here later.

FYI - for those who don't know the Sony PC-1000 doesn't have a nightshot mode so this will be interesting to see if an IR light will be of any benefit at improving low light video.

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