Properly selected, a book light can reduce eye fatigue by assuring ample light while reading, even in darkened venues, and can save both energy and money. A sturdy clip on book light design can make your light easy to affix to your book, book holder, or book stand, and many designs do double duty as hobby, craft, podium or task lights. Light weight incandescent or LED designs can put just the right amount of light exactly where you need it, without wasting energy or disturbing others around you, like a spouse or partner watching TV.
By illuminating your reading materials with just the correct quantity and temperature of light, a book light can help to save your eyes from strain and assist your reading in darkened venues. Our eyes require more light as we age, and providing the right amount of light for what we’re reading can be difficult. Obviously, the most perfect light for reading is natural sunlight shining directly over your shoulder, but we often wish to read when or where sunlight simply isn’t available. Hence, the right book light, a light we can use anywhere and anytime we choose, iscan be} an incredible convenience. Then, turning off the overheads and other lighting lighting things other than our reading, we save considerable energy and the money it takes to pay for it.
When making the choice between incandescent and LED designs, 3 primary concerns include: the differences in the type of light produced by these two distinct technologies, the cost of acquisition, and the cost of maintenance and operation over time. Incandescent lights typically produce a warm, somewhat golden-tinged light, and incandescent bulbs typically have service lives of between 15-25 hours of use and then must be replaced. LED lights put out a whiter, cooler light, with many designs now optimized to approximate the output of light from the sun. Today, many book lovers find the light of modern LEDs to be more “sun like”, producing greater clarity and contrast and making most printing easier to read. While replacement bulbs for many incandescent book light designs are generally available in local electronic retail shops, as well as over the Internet, the cost of replacement can really mount up over time. Since LEDs offer life expectancies of 10,000 to 50,000 hours, their 10-20% greater initial cost of acquisition quickly becomes irrelevant. For these and other reasons, LED lights are now the preferred choice over the older incandescent.
Battery powered clip on lights are the handiest, since your light can be used anywhere. Unfortunately, batteries too are a an item that must be replaced, typically lasting only 20-30 hours of use at best, in either LED or incandescent designs. Available A/C adapters are offered for most book lights, and another possibility is to use rechargeable batteries and a recharger. Most book lights use either AA or AAA batteries, and many rechargeable options exist. Additionally, if your light is typically used close to an A/C outlet, an optionally available A/C adapter can be a money saving investment.
Finally, the uniformity of light dispersal and the area over which it is dispersed is also a consideration when selecting the best book light for a particular application. If your light will only be used to light a standard size, mass market paperback, a single LED or incandescent portable design will likely be adequate; but, if you read magazines, most hard cover books or a stand full of music, you’ll need a more powerful design that distributes the light over a much broader area. The ideal way to determine the most perfect light for your particular application will be to test it in actual use. When shopping, be sure your retailer offers both good pre-sale and return service, in case your first choice doesn’t quite hit the mark. With a bit of application, you can acquire the perfect clip on light for just about any use.