E - Campfire

As debated a little in the Q8 thread.

Why have no one made a electric camp fire for use when open fire are not allowed out in the wild.

I am thinking something that fold up for minimal storage space.
Something that use RGB LED’s
Something you can put over a semi transparent plastic or rubber and then inflate or in another way suspend over the LED’s so the light look like a half orb.
Have RGB LED’s illuminate that plastic or rubber from below and then changing thru the predominant colors of a camp fire.

Have transition rate variable.
Have light level variable.

What do you guys think ?

Should it be something purpose made like i mention above, or should it be some form of add on to a regular flashlight.

Personally i am inclined to go with what i mention above as it would allow ( i think ) for a better spread of the light as some of the LED’s can be angled more horizontal where as the flashlight with add on route only having its light go in one direction, or at least the bulk of its light.

Im thinking something the size of a LP when deployed, something that can run all night, maybe have a light sensor for automatic off.

Yeah, something purpose-made would be better, I think. But, it needs to be compact when not in use. Something inflatable, as you suggested, might do the trick. Fire is hard to emulate in a realistic way. I don’t know if technology is sufficiently advanced yet.

Yeah but just a good try at looking like real fire will be better and more comfy than any flashlight or lantern.
Off course it will not replace a lantern or flashlight, but for a camping situation and background light source at night i think it could be quite cool.

And i dont know about where you guys are, but here in Denmark during summer we often have a ban on open fire in the wild.

Nice you spin-it-off :wink:

I have seen lights in Amsterdam
A light facing upwards
A few pieces of light cloth right above it and a fan below the light.
The moving cloth makes it look like fire, very neat

Yeah i have seen those too, but i think adding moving components like a fan and the fluttering cloth/plastic are just complicating matters.

Would be just fine for a fake fireplace at home, but will be too complicated for a camping situation.

Have you ever been to Disneyland (or a similar resort in your part of the world)? On the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, there are several areas with fake fire. In the early 1990s, my sister was in the Girl Scouts and my mom called up Disneyland asking where they could buy a fake fire like that because they were going to do a “camp out” but were not allowed to use a real fire. Disneyland put my mom in contact with the company that did the special effects and they donated an actual unit to the Girl Scout troop. Pretty cool. Basically some flickering lights and a fan blowing the fake fire around.

No, while i have been to many countries and most parts of the world ( minus Africa and south of the Antarctic circle )
Then it have always been work related and so little time to get under the skin of the people and places there.
I have only been on Holiday 1 time, and that was 32 years ago and it was 14 days on Ibiza as “bodyguard” for 2 of my friends girlfriends.

Nice of that company to donate a unit like that, sadly that’s not really how things work here, though Danes also donate to this and that its not really in our skill set, at least not compared to Americans.
At least that’s what i think.

Mostly it seem like we just pay a lot in taxes and then let “big brother” take care of things, and Denmark have also been one of the more generous countries with aid to this and that if you factor with size and population.

This is a fun idea although the Q8 is about the perfect base for such an idea really. Long battery life and good output.

It would be easy enough to come up with some form of “tent” to go over the light to give it the right color and diffuse the light to campfire like levels.

The trick is programming the actual firelight flicker to look right. That is no easy task.

You would need to somehow record the lux from an actual fire in high resolution and from that you could use a script to try to mimic it. Although it could take a lot of code space as well.

I realize that 5mm are not exactly high output, but candle flicker LED’s are already a thing.

Evil Mad Scientist is where I bought some. I built a “campfire” for a sleepover my daughter had a few years ago. Four paper towel tubes to look like logs, arranged around a four inch fan blowing upwards on some red and orange toole (tule? flouncy fabric) with several of these in there. Ran the whole thing on a 5 or 12 volt power supply. The kids enjoyed it.

Those Evil Mad Scientist LEDs look cool… A few years ago (about 2003) my cousin was trying out for captain of her high school’s drill team. Part of the project was a notebook that had to really stand out. I decided to help her ( :smiling_imp: ) by working on the notebook. She was allowed and encouraged to solicit help from family members…

The drill team was called the “flaming flashes” and the school color was red…

We she first made a silhouette cutout of a drill team member and cut it from reflective material and put it behind the clear paper cover on the front of the notebook. She then traced an outline of flames, which I then transferred onto a sheet of thin plexiglass and cut out, with notches at the bottom. Then, I sanded the surface of the plexiglass to frost it.I found a circuit schematic for a random firelight flicker driver, ordered the components, and hand assembled it using perfboard from radio shack. I wired a series of red 3mm LEDs, which I then glued to the base of the flames, which was then placed on the cover of the notebook, overlapping the silhouette on the cover. When the power was connected, the LEDs would flicker, creating the Flashing Flames on the cover of the notebook. It was an awesome effect which blew the judges away. Needless to say, she got the drill team captain position… :smiley:

But I think the LEDs with the built in circuit would be an easier option now…

Are you allowed to use a grill and cook out in the wild? If so, make yourself or buy a portable propane fire pit with ceramic logs. While not as nice as burning real logs, would be much nicer than a flashlight or some sort of fake fire.

Something like this. This uses Lava rocks

Also, a full flickering fire kit…

It will have to be something with a okay lumen output for sure, even if you are just going to mimic a camp fire scenario.

We have used some flickering LED tea candles ( running off button cell ) to mimic the lighting on the passenger coaches ( old style pullman coaches ) for my friends G-scale layout in the garden.

2 of those in each wagon roof did well for the night time running on the garden railway ( sorry no video of it )

But for a E - campfire you will have to one up that many times.

Meld-x has candle mode but I’m guessing you want more output. Maybe ask TTerev3 for his thoughts on the matter.

You mean like this one?

This was one i built some years back during a fire-ban during one dry summer at our old cottage. Its made from orange mini-lights, a dozen of those “flicker-flame” bulbs, a fan, some silk, and orange/yellow reflector bulbs. ( added some frosted plastic, some paint, a piece of plywood, soem small logs, wood screws, and voila… a convincing campfire without real flame or heat. I still use it now sometimes. from a distance its quite convincing. I can add more photos on how its built and a video if you like.

/\\\\\\
That looks good. :+1: . Pretty convincing looking from the pics. :slight_smile:

Smoke? In the eyes…

Here is one based on mains power supply.

@DBSAR That looks great !
Can you post a video ?

Here is a video of it running. ( the fan is not as loud as it sounds in the video, phone camera is picking it up quite louder than it actually is.