"Lighting over gaming table" Topic

Hi all… I need to make some decisions about how I am going to provide lighting to my custom 9ft gaming table. Luckily it is going into a new house that is currently being built so I can do almost anything.. At this stage I just have 5 down lights planned in the gaming room (5.2x 5.4 meter room) which the eleco thinks will be fine.. I was thinking that some pool table lights directly over the table might be a good idea… Any thoughts or advice out there for me?

Cheers

I would put an 8 foot fluorescent light centered over the table on a separate circuit from the room lighting. Anything suspended from the ceiling to less than 6 feet high will interfere with the cross-table interaction of players.

I use a row of halogen spotlights to give nice white light.

I've seen this done so many ways – and, for myself, I don't think individual spot lighting or suspended down lights work well at all – you end up with patches of light and overall the table can be quite dim. Some folks go for these GU halogen spot lights in the ceiling – the sort of thing you get in kitchens – and 1) the light is very yellow, 2) you are forever changing the things! 3) unless you have lots of them you get the patchy effect. They also run hot… very hot! I gather LEDs are the way to go these days if you like the spotlight/downlight approach – but they have colour issues too.

I've seen four or five individual standard light bulbs suspended over a table – not bright enough, patchy – although your eyes do adjust over an evening. A suspended pool table style light tends to get in the way to be honest – and you get a very powerful, strongly directional puddle of light that can leave the edges of a large table quite dark. Not enough room in the hood for enough tubes IMO. It looks pretty I know … but just be wary you could end up with something that isn't entirely functional.

So – what I reckon works best is good ambient lighting from tubes – in so far as possible not directional lighting – and either daylight quality or full spectrum quality (which is closer to daylight than standard daylight). As many tubes as you can – as much room width as you can manage – over the whole ceiling spaced apart maybe about 6 feet if you can manage it. You don't need to drop the tubes down unless the ceiling is very high. If the space is very large you might want to have separate switches so you can use less light when you're not gaming.

I know it sounds a bit industrial:) Mind you – I have half a mind on photography – which might not be a consideration of course!

If it's a new build – and the electrician is arranging the wiring pre-stud work – then I'd try and make sure you have as much flexibility as possible, so you can add or move lights later on – because it's easy to run a cable at that stage – tricky later on.

But of course – it's your room to do with as you please – have fun with it!

Awesome response… Interestingly the eleco originally suggested flouro tubes but I shied away because of the 'industrial' look as per above… Maybe I need to re think that…. But yep pool table lights are off the agenda.. Great advice there.

Cheers!

I agree with Cold Steel. That is what I have for mine and it works well, although it is a bit smaller.

I would put about 8 can lights recessed between the floor joist. I would put the lights on a dimmer switch. With 8 lights on a 9' table you will have even lighting on the entire table.

Two rows of 3 or 4 recessed lights each that would run with the long edges of the table rather than one row down the middle. I use two dimmable torch style floor lamps that project light onto the ceiling to supplement the amount of light if needed.

DM

I've got two 4 light ceiling fans over my 5 x 9 table and they were a mistake. There is plenty of light but when the fans are on, it flickers to distraction. In a re-do I would go for flourescent tubes along the lines of what Rick P had to say.

I did mine along the lines of what Rick P said. It works well. I don't think it has an industrial look as they make good looking housings, or whatever they should be called, for them.

My table is 15' x 7' and I have a total of 12 tubes. There are two in each fixture. So, six fixtures, arranged in two rows running down the length of the table.

Tom

I think something like this might look good.. say four in the middle of the room above the table area, with some downlights on the outside of the room..

link

Thoughts?

My friend does not have lights directly over the table, but instead has twin rows of spotlights that run most of the length of the room, plus some recessed lighting tubes against the wall, hidden by a screen. My point of mentioning this is that if you do indeed put some sort of large/thorough lighting directly over the gaming area/table, I would make sure and have plenty of other lighting for the room as a whole. The contrast between lights directly over the table and the rest of a more-dimly lit room will tire your eyes after a while.