Room effect lighting..

["Ian Lowe" <ianlowe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Looking for some advice...

I'm returning to our computer room to see about improving the mood slightly
- we painted the room black (completely black - ceiling included) with
light
pine flooring and desks it's rather cool. The room is lit with IKEA's Blue
LED strips - consumes about 20 watts in total and quite an impressive light
level.

I'm finding, however, that the room is just a little *too* dark for working
in for an extended period.

The plan is to paint the ceiling and top 20cm of the wall white and add a
fake ceiling (not sure what this is actually called) around 30cm deep all
the way around at this height. Above this edge of plasterboard, I'll place
RGB LEDs driven by a couple of Gerry Duprey's RGB LED controller boards.
I'm
also planning to put a couple of mains halogens up in opposite corners on
an
X10 module so I can add some *real* light if required.

The intention is to run on the LEDs for normal night time use (perhaps
40-50
watts in total?) and use the halogens if I need bright working light.

The question is - has anyone done this before? How important is the
smoothness of the ceiling? What's a good paint to use? Is brilliant white
the best, or would a pearlescent paint be better?

Ian.