Homemade Fluorescent Bulb Ring Light

Here’s a variation to the ringlight project of Joseph Holst which used plywood and a set of 8 incandescent bulbs to make the ring.

Robert Starr from Australia shares with us his own version of the project using one circular fluorescent bulb instead of the 8 incandescents to provide a continuous ring of light reflected in the subject’s eyes.

The project seems quite straightforward and looks pretty quick to accomplish, even easier than the 8-bulb ring light because there is only one light involved. Bob says the 32W fluorescent bulb gives the equivalent light of a 100W incandescent, compared to the 8-bulb ring light which burns a total of 800W when using 100W bulbs.

His materials are: a circular fluorescent bulb, a ballast, a starter, a rocker switch, some wires and some wood.

32-Watt Circular Flourescent Bulb	Flourescent Light Starter
A Rocker Switch	Flourescent Light Ballast

The first thing he did was to assemble and check the electrical components to make sure that the circuit was working well.

Light is OK, circuit is working

Next is creating the wooden housing. He makes a circular hole on a piece of square plywood that will hold the fluorescent bulb, making sure that the hole is a bit smaller than the inner diameter of the ringlight. Then he makes the wooden box that will hold the fluorescent ballast and assembles the whole wooden structure together. In hindsight, Bob says he should have used thicker plywood to hold the ringlight as this one in the photo is a little too thin.

Plywood and wood block side by side	Plywood and wood block assembled
Wire inserted through hole in wood	Yes, still lights up!

The electrical parts are screwed in place into the base of the box making sure that the screws do not penetrate the bottom to minimize any chance of anybody getting in contact with electricity. The little part of the circuit that holds the starter goes up through the middle and plugs into place on the bulb. This is important to note as you should orient the bulb so that the connector is at the bottom in the center. The circular bulb is tied firmly into place by wires.

Ballast is screwed firmly	Starter situated at bottom

Then the wooden assembly is given a good paint job, black at the back and white in front.

Assembly painted white	Black overcoat at the back

Then the final assembly is lighted and ready for action.

Ready for shooting

The result: a nice pair of ringlights reflected on Karen’s eyes.

Thanks to Robert Starr for this tutorial. You can see details of this project here.