Sunrise and Sunset true Lighting factors

Sunrises and sunsets look completely different from each other.

Morning light is cool and clear, evening light is saturated with warm colors.

The difference is the air temperatures.

Light varies from season to season so a winter sunset should be cooler light than a summer sunrise the reason is the presence of more particles in the air at the end of the day.

The best layout lighting has a point source as well as general broad lighting.

With the appropriate light sources and terrain modeling the layout should get a realistic overall appearance.

Proper lighting is a very important part of any model train layout.

A full-spectrum bulb is a bulb that closely mimics the light frequencies of the sun. These bulbs are not the same as "daylight" bulbs.

Full-spectrum bulbs have a Color Rendering Index (CRI) of 90 or higher and are typically offered in the 5000 to 6500 Kelvin range. 5000 is a "warmer" color (but technically a cooler color temperature) and 6500 is more "bluish" or "arctic white".

By way of contrast, normal "cool white" fluorescents have a CRI in the 60s and a color temperature typically around 2700K.

Full-spectrum bulbs try to more closely mimic the spectral output of the sun. Rather than having huge spikes in the orange and green parts of the spectrum, full-spectrum bulbs try to have smaller spikes in those areas, and better output in areas such as the reds.

Full-Spectrum bulbs produce a color that has much less of a color cast than normal lamps.

Regular fluorescents bulb produces green, orange and pink casts.

Normal incandescent bulbs produce a yellow/red colorcast.

Easy Way to Make Bulbs Last Longer | Link to Lamp Calculator |

Simply operate a light bulb at a lower voltage than its rated voltage.

Life expectancy is generally about inversely proportional to voltage to the 12th power.

At half voltage, a light bulb will last something like 4,000 times its rated life expectancy.

Having the filament run at a lower temperature reduces the energy efficiency of a light bulb. Even at usual operating temperatures for 750-1,000 hour light bulbs, a tungsten filament produces about 93 percent of its radiation in the infrared. That does not mean good efficiency at producing visible light.

With a lower filament temperature, the percentage of radiation in the infrared increases and the percentage of radiation in visible light decreases. A light bulb that is 6-7 percent efficient in producing visible light at full voltage is only about 2 percent efficient in producing visible light at half its rated voltage.