When selected properly, a book light can reduce eye stress by providing excellent lighting while reading, even in darkened venues, and can help to save both energy and money. A sturdy clip on book light design can make your light easy to attach to your book, book holder, or book stand, and many designs can do double duty as craft, podium, hobby or other task lighting. Light weight incandescent or LED designs can put just the right lighting anywhere you need it, without wasting energy or disturbing those around you, like a spouse or partner on the other side of the bed.
By illuminating your reading materials with the right amount and color of light, a book light can help to save your eyes from strain and help you read even when the lights are low. 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 best light for reading is natural sunlight coming directly from over your shoulder, but we often need to read when or where sunlight isn’t available. Hence, the right book light, one we can use anywhere and anytime we choose, iscan be} an incredible convenience. By then turning off the overheads and other lighting lighting things other than our reading, we save considerable energy as well as the money it takes to pay for it.
When making the choice between incandescent and LED designs, 3 primary considerations include: the different color or temperature of light produced by these two distinct technologies, the cost of acquisition, and the cost of maintenance and operation over time. Incandescent light sources typically create a warm, somewhat yellowish light, and bulbs typically have service lives of between 15-25 hours of use and then must be replaced. LED lights create a whiter, cooler light, with many designs now optimized to approximate the output of lighting from the sun. Today, most book lovers find the light of modern LEDs to be more “sun like”, producing greater clarity and contrast and making all printing easier to read. While replacement incandescent bulbs are generally available in local stores, and over the Internet, the expense and inconvenience of replacement can really add up over time. Because LEDs provide life expectancies of 10,000 to 50,000 hours, the 10-20% greater initial purchase price quickly becomes irrelevant. For these and other reasons, LED lights are now more popular than the older incandescent.
Battery powered book lights are the handiest, since your light can be used almost anywhere. Unfortunately, batteries themselves are also a replaceable item, typically lasting 20-30 hours of use at best, in LED or incandescent designs. Available A/C adapters are offered for most book lights, and another possibility is to use a good battery recharger and rechargeable batteries. Most book lights use either AA or AAA batteries, and many excellent models are available from which to choose. Additionally, if your light is to be used near to an A/C outlet, an optionally available A/C adapter can be a money saving investment.
Finally, the area over which the light is dispersed is also an important consideration when choosing the best book light for a particular application. If your light will only be used to light a standard size, mass market paperback, a simple LED or incandescent portable design will likely be adequate; however, if you read magazines, most hard cover books or a stand full of music, you’ll want a more powerful light that can distribute the light over an appropriately larger area. The best way to determine the best light for any particular application will be to test it in actual use. When shopping, make sure your retailer offers both good pre-sale and return service, in case your first choice turns out not to be as suitable as you had hoped. With diligence, you can find the perfect book light for just about any use.
