Support NeoGAF

[888]

So I have been obsessed with Smart lighting for a few years now. I also love gaming, so combining them has led to a good week project.

I had done some early tests with the smart lighting and Razers Chroma software and found it lacking. Philips recently released their software which is much easier to use for what I wanted to do with it. So over the past week I have been playing with it on my gaming pc. At first I had just a hue light strip plus, a Hue Go and 4 Color A19 bulbs (3 in a ceiling fan and 1 in a lamp next to the monitor). Well I ended up being blown away at how well it worked I ended up ordering their new Play Light Bars and tossed the Hue Go on top of the monitor until I can get another bar for the top. Here are some of the games I was using to test with.

Just Cause 3. Seems like there is a problem with this video when linking from Gaf. Had to link it differently.

Link



Ori is particularly good for the Sync software because of all the smooth color transitions in the game. It’s a beautiful game and it shows thru with Sync.


Anyone else tried this yet? I’ve been pretty happy with it from a gaming aspect but it isn’t ready for the TV yet. Integrating it there isn’t easy and requires some creativity until full apps are released.

Here are the lights that are being used.

Play Light Bars x 2
Hue Go
Hue Light Strip Plus
Hue Color Bulbs x 3 (Easily can be done without)




Tested mounting them behind the monitor. May have done it too high.



And one already fell off. Need different mounting tape.

 

[ancelotti]

Bias lighting is definitely underrated and can make a big difference in a low light situations. Another one of my favorite lighting tricks is using a music visualizer with a Corsair RGB keyboard. Yeah, it's kinda silly, but it looks and feels awesome while I'm getting my butt handed to me in various online shooters.

 

[MultiCore]

Looks neat, I'll have to look into it. If the latency is low enough, I'd definitely consider it.

I really want MS to look at IllumiRoom again.

 

[Spukc]

Your screen makes light. Why even...

 

[BigBooper]

The Ori video certainly looks cool, I just rarely sit in the dark.

 

[Geki-D]

What really blows be away about this is that in both videos and this thread you've managed to misspell Philips 3 times.

But seriously, that's pretty cool, though seeing as I do most of my gaming on the TV, that's where I'd be after having this. And you say that it doesn't really work for TVs yet? Could you post a pic of the actual lights on your PC?

 

[888]

Looks neat, I'll have to look into it. If the latency is low enough, I'd definitely consider it.

I really want MS to look at IllumiRoom again.

So latency is actually really low but it is dependent on CPU. There are some settings for how aggressive you want it to be. There is really only one time I saw it go out of sync and cause a big enough visual delay and it was actually during the just cause 3 video that I linked. It was when Rico was getting introduced. Other than that it is usually right on queue.

What really blows be away about this is that in both videos and this thread you've managed to misspell Philips 3 times.

But seriously, that's pretty cool, though seeing as I do most of my gaming on the TV, that's where I'd be after having this. And you say that it doesn't really work for TVs yet? Could you post a pic of the actual lights on your PC?

Ha. Thanks for pointing out the Philips spelling.

It works with Philips TVs but from what I have seen people are routing TV through their PCs to get it to work. I’ve even seen people do Remote Play to get it to work on a PS4. More hoops than I’m willing to do just yet.

When you say actual lights on my Pc are you talking about my Case lights?

 

[Geki-D]

When you say actual lights on my Pc are you talking about my Case lights?

No, I meant a pic of the Philips Lights, but looking it up I see that those 2 bars left & right are the lights. I thought they were speakers and the lights were smaller, stuck behind the screen. Bit of a shame for TVs it's so limited.

 

[Mistershine.]

Chariot for the xbox one has native support for hue lights. I wish more games did it, having your lights go red in sync with the crimson omen on gears or having the room lights change levels to match the game when entering/exiting caves and such would be amazing.

 

[888]

No, I meant a pic of the Philips Lights, but looking it up I see that those 2 bars left & right are the lights. I thought they were speakers and the lights were smaller, stuck behind the screen. Bit of a shame for TVs it's so limited.

Yeah. They look like they are speakers. My sound bar is tucked right below the monitor. I’m considering mounting the lights on the back of the monitor so they are out of view but I’m waiting to grab some 3M Velcro so they are more removable than the regular 3M mounting stuff they came with.

There is also the light at the top of the monitor which I would prefer be a bar so it isn’t visible.

Here’s two sloppy static pics of the lights just on while I was situating them.

 

[888]

Chariot for the xbox one has native support for hue lights. I wish more games did it, having your lights go red in sync with the crimson omen on gears or having the room lights change levels to match the game when entering/exiting caves and such would be amazing.

If I remember correctly games like Overwtach on PC can flash certain lights when abilities are ready etc but that required the Chroma software which I removed a long time ago. Would need to try it again.

If they had Xbox or PS4 support I would easily order a few for the TVs.

 

[Moses85]

Sorry for asking but is this also possible in combination with consoles?

 

[888]

Sorry for asking but is this also possible in combination with consoles?

Natively, not yet. There is a Camera App that you point your phone towards the screen and it works with the lights. Or remote play on the PC for PS4 tricks it and can control the lights from the PC. It’s still fairly new, I think Philips only released the initial version a 6 months ago and this new updated version in November I believe. Someone above mentioned a game that supported it on the Xbox so maybe on a per game basis we may see support for it.

 

[Boss Mog]

Watching a screen that projects light at you in the dark in very bad for your eyes.

 

[888]

Watching a screen that projects light at you in the dark in very bad for your eyes.

It’s indirect lighting tho, nothing it pointed directly towards you. I’m general once you are playing the lights are mostly on to a degree.

 

[GC_DALBEN]

So I have been obsessed with Smart lighting for a few years now. I also love gaming, so combining them has led to a good week project.

I had done some early tests with the smart lighting and Razers Chroma software and found it lacking. Philips recently released their software which is much easier to use for what I wanted to do with it. So over the past week I have been playing with it on my gaming pc. At first I had just a hue light strip plus, a Hue Go and 4 Color A19 bulbs (3 in a ceiling fan and 1 in a lamp next to the monitor). Well I ended up being blown away at how well it worked I ended up ordering their new Play Light Bars and tossed the Hue Go on top of the monitor until I can get another bar for the top. Here are some of the games I was using to test with.

Just Cause 3. Seems like there is a problem with this video when linking from Gaf. Had to link it differently.

Link

Ori is particularly good for the Sync software because of all the smooth color transitions in the game. It’s a beautiful game and it shows thru with Sync.


Anyone else tried this yet? I’ve been pretty happy with it from a gaming aspect but it isn’t ready for the TV yet. Integrating it there isn’t easy and requires some creativity until full apps are released.

Its hard to setup? Do you know a good guide? Looks great

 

[Shai-Tan]

Watching a screen that projects light at you in the dark in very bad for your eyes.

Beyond causing some eye straight it's not? And bias lighting helps, not hinders that. I don't do synchronized colored bias lighting but I have a lamp behind my tv to make it less annoying when transitioning from dark to light scenes.

 

[888]

Its hard to setup? Do you know a good guide? Looks great

It’s super easy. If you already have a Hue System for your house you just need to setup an Entertainment area in the app. Would look like this.



Then you install the Hue Sync software on the PC and that’s pretty much it. There are some settings for music, games, videos etc you can play with but it pretty much is straight forward.

The worst part is the cost of everything but if you started with (assuming you have a Hub already) the bar lights it’s 120 for a pair.

 

[888]

Beyond causing some eye straight it's not? And bias lighting helps, not hinders that. I don't do synchronized colored bias lighting but I have a lamp behind my tv to make it less annoying when transitioning from dark to light scenes.

I usually have background lighting on too. Even with lights on you can still get a good effect from the syncing. I stopped playing in the dark years ago from eye strain.

But beyond that playing games like Forza the lights are on and bright without much flashing. If you go into a wooded area one light may turn green etc. Using Cut scenes you get way more crazy effects.

Tho getting flash banged in Rainbow Six Sucks even more with these. Considering it’s 7 lights in the room that go bright white.

 

[Shai-Tan]

I've went Wemo so far for my smart devices but worth thinking about switching over. Hue is significantly more expensive so maybe I just look into the hue sync lighting for pc and still do Wemo for everything else

 

[ROMhack]

Set-up looks great!

 

[888]

I've went Wemo so far for my smart devices but worth thinking about switching over. Hue is significantly more expensive so maybe I just look into the hue sync lighting for pc and still do Wemo for everything else

Yeah. Hue is very expensive but their app and support so far have been worth it to me. I’m at 34 lights and having it all the same has it’s benefits. But if you already are invested in something else it’s hard to make that switch. Tho for something like this you can grab a cheap starter kit on sale and grab the bars and maybe a strip and be set for just the entertainment portion. I’ve seen the plain white starter kits really cheap on sale. Even the 4 bulb color kits were like 150 ish or less during the recent sales.

 

[888]

Could you post a pic of the actual lights on your PC?

Here grabbed these to give a better idea of the lights in use.

 

[dorkimoe]

Love my hue lights, but so dissapointed there is no integration into my android tv/xbox/ps4/roku/plex pretty much SOMETHING needs to have it by now

 

[888]

Love my hue lights, but so dissapointed there is no integration into my android tv/xbox/ps4/roku/plex pretty much SOMETHING needs to have it by now

Yeah but the entertainment portion is still fairly early on. I’m just glad they released their own app and that the Razer app on pc isn’t the only way to use it.

As soon as they have more integration I’ll buy more for the TV areas.

 

[Deputy Moonman]

This looks awesome. Would make it really easy to get absorbed/enveloped into the game. I imagine playing games like Tetris Effect or Geometry Wars would be fantastic too.

 

[888]

This looks awesome. Would make it really easy to get absorbed/enveloped into the game. I imagine playing games like Tetris Effect or Geometry Wars would be fantastic too.

Hmm now I need to see what else I have on Pc to test with. I don’t think they released Tetris Effect on pc did they?

 

[Kenpachii]

Watching a screen that projects light at you in the dark in very bad for your eyes.

Jup also reason why VR is terrible.

Always have lights on with gaming as its mostly longer then a hour or two that you play.

Also my new TV has this feature where it can move along with music / colors of the screen in movies. It was the first thing i put off as it lights up the whole area behind it and it's massively distracting after 5 minutes of having it on.

 

[Deputy Moonman]

Hmm now I need to see what else I have on Pc to test with. I don’t think they released Tetris Effect on pc did they?

Dang you're right. I wasn't really thinking about what was on pc versus console, but I love the concept.

 

[HeisenbergFX4]

This is pretty cool.

My gaming setup in my basement I have a set of Logitech G560 speakers that really add a nice level of immersion.

Not my video but this is how they work.

 

[TheKingOfSheep]

I didn't even know something like this exists, before today. This is so cool. I... I must have this.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

This is very interesting, and I think it has strong potential. Bigger screens are not necessarily better for gaming. We have an "ideal viewing area" dictated by biology. Activity outside of that area will be perceived at a lower level of detail anyway. This notion is leveraged for foveated rendering, too. ( I did a write-up about saccades, viewing area, and response time for those who want more nitty-gritty about screen size and type and why it matters for twitch-speed gaming.)

For a practical application, I can see someone spending their money on a decent screen plus a Hue Sync setup for far less than a multi-monitor setup without much loss to perceived experience. It's like having the benefits of a big TV or a big projector (fills the whole room with awesome color) without the drawbacks (expensive, can add latency, can distract the eye and degrade your ability to respond to action on the screen).

 

[888]

This is pretty cool.

My gaming setup in my basement I have a set of Logitech G560 speakers that really add a nice level of immersion.

Not my video but this is how they work.

I almost went with these but decided to keep my Razer Soundbar and just add more to the current hue system we already had. It really does add to the experience.

 

[888]

This is very interesting, and I think it has strong potential. Bigger screens are not necessarily better for gaming. We have an "ideal viewing area" dictated by biology. Activity outside of that area will be perceived at a lower level of detail anyway. This notion is leveraged for foveated rendering, too. ( I did a write-up about saccades, viewing area, and response time for those who want more nitty-gritty about screen size and type and why it matters for twitch-speed gaming.)

For a practical application, I can see someone spending their money on a decent screen plus a Hue Sync setup for far less than a multi-monitor setup without much loss to perceived experience. It's like having the benefits of a big TV or a big projector (fills the whole room with awesome color) without the drawbacks (expensive, can add latency, can distract the eye and degrade your ability to respond to action on the screen).

I’ll take a nice monitor over a big screen or multi screen setup any day. The current TVs I have rate really low on input lag and latency but still compared to a monitor there is 0 comparison.

I used to have a triple monitor setup but I hated it. Even tho they were all the same monitor there were color differences in the panels that drove me nuts. I sold them and invested in the Asus ROG Swift PG279Q and never looked back. High refresh rates and GSync made a huge difference.

Whenever I build a Pc for someone I always push for a nice monitor but rarely they spend the money on one. They opt for some 100 dollar special after building a 2k Rig.

 

[hollowcupra]

I'm using a raspberry with Hyperion Ambilight for the same project. It also works for all HDMI sources.

It's something you have to build for yourself but it's rather cheap. Like 120 Euros for everything.

 

[Von Hugh]

You can integrate Philips Hue lights with Philips Ambilight TVs. It is native support in a sense. I disabled it, though, because it was just too ridiculous, I'll stay with just Ambilight by itself.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

I’ll take a nice monitor over a big screen or multi screen setup any day. The current TVs I have rate really low on input lag and latency but still compared to a monitor there is 0 comparison.

I used to have a triple monitor setup but I hated it. Even tho they were all the same monitor there were color differences in the panels that drove me nuts. I sold them and invested in the Asus ROG Swift PG279Q and never looked back. High refresh rates and GSync made a huge difference.

Whenever I build a Pc for someone I always push for a nice monitor but rarely they spend the money on one. They opt for some 100 dollar special after building a 2k Rig.

Unfortunately, many folks are duped by the official marketing. These customers tend to focus only on a few numbers that the companies themselves are pushing.

 

[pr0cs]

I feel like the value of lighting is dependent both on the proximity of the TV to the wall as well as the wall color. And that the bigger the tv the less cost effective it would be due to the sheer number of LEDs required to make the effect reasonable

 

[888]

I feel like the value of lighting is dependent both on the proximity of the TV to the wall as well as the wall color. And that the bigger the tv the less cost effective it would be due to the sheer number of LEDs required to make the effect reasonable

I pulled the lights a decent way from the wall and it doesn’t do too bad. On the color topic my walls are a decently dark blue and I was surprised at how well it shows up. If it was black or something that deep it would certainly be an issue. I saw a video review of them and the guy didn’t like the lights but he had a black wall. People were calling him out on that.

I mean how far do people pull their tvs out from the wall? Or monitor in the case of PCs.

 

[pr0cs]

I mean how far do people pull their tvs out from the wall? Or monitor in the case of PCs.

Well my cave walls are a dark beige / brown but luckily can get pitch black for lighting. I'd be tempted to even paint the wall the tv is against if I could be certain that the effect would be better. I use a tv stand which has the back of the TV at least 20" from the wall so that's my biggest concern. Low contrast wall color and distance makes me think it just wouldn't work out.

Where is a good place to get decent led strips? Aliexpress sell sets or do I need something more comprehensive?

 

[Manus]

I have the Phillips Hue strips behind my monitors and TV and love them. Haven't tried any of the sync stuff yet just usually prefer to keep them at a static color.

 

[888]

Well my cave walls are a dark beige / brown but luckily can get pitch black for lighting. I'd be tempted to even paint the wall the tv is against if I could be certain that the effect would be better. I use a tv stand which has the back of the TV at least 20" from the wall so that's my biggest concern. Low contrast wall color and distance makes me think it just wouldn't work out.

Where is a good place to get decent led strips? Aliexpress sell sets or do I need something more comprehensive?

I use the Hue light strip plus that way it’s in sync with my stuff. Anything outside of that won’t work for this.

But if you just wanted a cheap strip to play with I saw Monster sells them now at Walmart for like 20 bucks. It only does like 5 colors but it’s still pretty cheap.

 

[pr0cs]

I use the Hue light strip plus that way it’s in sync with my stuff. Anything outside of that won’t work for this.

But if you just wanted a cheap strip to play with I saw Monster sells them now at Walmart for like 20 bucks. It only does like 5 colors but it’s still pretty cheap.

Yeah I guess I was thinking more along the lines of a Hyperion Ambilight hack using RPI3 since I have one lying around already. A lot more more work but less money overall and perhaps maybe a little more flexible.
It's stuff like this though that makes me wonder about people that say "oh I'm bored, I need to go to work otherwise I'd go crazy". To me that's crazy. There are so many cool projects and stuff out there now, especially with the internet. There simply isn't enough time in the day to investigate them all.. especially when you have to work for a living.

 

[888]

Yeah I guess I was thinking more along the lines of a Hyperion Ambilight hack using RPI3 since I have one lying around already. A lot more more work but less money overall and perhaps maybe a little more flexible.
It's stuff like this though that makes me wonder about people that say "oh I'm bored, I need to go to work otherwise I'd go crazy". To me that's crazy. There are so many cool projects and stuff out there now, especially with the internet. There simply isn't enough time in the day to investigate them all.. especially when you have to work for a living.

I could easily keep myself busy without needing to work. Assuming money wasn’t an issue.

 

[Fuz]

Looks pretty cool, but I'll probably burn it in a week due to my constant alt-tabbing while gaming.

 

[888]

Looks pretty cool, but I'll probably burn it in a week due to my constant alt-tabbing while gaming.

Oh don't worry, it will do all of your desktop colors too =).

 

[Toe-Knee]

What really blows be away about this is that in both videos and this thread you've managed to misspell Philips 3 times.

But seriously, that's pretty cool, though seeing as I do most of my gaming on the TV, that's where I'd be after having this. And you say that it doesn't really work for TVs yet? Could you post a pic of the actual lights on your PC?

Philips sell ambilight TV's that do this in sync with whatever is displayed on the screen.

You can also get third party systems such as ihoment by minger that uses a camera that tracks the screen

 

[Geki-D]

Philips sell ambilight TV's that do this in sync with whatever is displayed on the screen.

You can also get third party systems such as ihoment by minger that uses a camera that tracks the screen

The camera sounds like silly levels of faffing around and I don't really want to change TV. I guess the way to cookie crumbles is that each TV maker wants people to buy their TVs with these ambilight options so they have no reason to easily make third party lights work.

 

[Toe-Knee]

The camera sounds like silly levels of faffing around and I don't really want to change TV. I guess the way to cookie crumbles is that each TV maker wants people to buy their TVs with these ambilight options so they have no reason to easily make third party lights work.

The camera setup is actually pretty simple. Just sits atop the TV.

The only faff really is the calibration which takes about ten seconds or so

 

[Geki-D]

The camera setup is actually pretty simple. Just sits atop the TV.

The only faff really is the calibration which takes about ten seconds or so

Huh.
Looked into it and found this video showing it off:

Looks pretty decent, actually. Though I have a curved Samsung TV so I'm not too sure it would work.

Also saw this mentioned in the comments:

This one uses a HDMI pass through (and is apparently 4x the price), so no camera but damn do those LEDs look weak as fuck in that video. Barely visible on his wall.