Optical fibers are woven through the underside of the bedspread to conduct and diffuse light from a tanning bed-like lamp.
Set the timer to establish desired overall exposer and the device will turn itself on and off, for a few seconds at a time, over the course of the night. Natural restlessness ensures an even tan.
Cheaper than a vacation, easier than going to the tanning salon. Not recommended for children.
Yes, it was just a matter of time before someone found a way for you to be productive while you slept.
(P.S. Admins: I considered Home:Bed, but wanted to emphasise the tanning aspect. Move it if you feel otherwise.)-- phoenix, Apr 14 2002 ANI-Motion http://www.animot.com/This company designs and manufactures animated clothing. My personal favorite is the Harley-Davidson jacket, on which the back logo lights up when the bike's brakes are applied. [waugsqueke, Apr 15 2002] Hope you have health insurance http://www.aad.org/pamphlets/darker.html [mrthingy, Apr 15 2002, last modified Oct 21 2004] 3M Light Fibers http://www.3m.com/a...ologies/lightfiber/Side-emitting fiber optics [spartanica, Apr 15 2002, last modified Oct 21 2004] If you sleep in the same roughly entangled position with your partner every night you may be forced to, uhhhhh, try new positions to avoid white patches.-- Helium, Apr 14 2002 remove all tight clothing to eliminate chafing. eh, p?-- po, Apr 14 2002 Shouldn't one oil up prior to natural restlessness?-- spartanica, Apr 14 2002 [spartanica] As you wish, but you might consider non-absorbant sheets.-- phoenix, Apr 14 2002 But I've been raised to keep my hands on top of the bedspread (don't know why). Won't my arms be pale?-- FarmerJohn, Apr 15 2002 This would be nearly impossible to do without getting patchy results.-- stupop, Apr 15 2002 Just to clarify: I'm thinking of something that comes on for a few seconds at a time. The overall exposure is determined by the user, but is portioned out over a few hours. This ensures the user isn't in the kitchen getting a midnight munchie and missing all the light. It also improves the odds of even exposure (since it's likely the user has moved since the last exposure)
[FarmerJohn] Your arms might be pale, but your palms won't be hairy.-- phoenix, Apr 15 2002 I think there's a problem you may have overlooked, phoenix. As I understand it, optical fibers work precisely because they do not leak light through the fiber wall, but deliver the great majority of the light from one end of the fiber to the other. Fibers woven into a blanket are oriented so that the direction of light transfer required would be through the walls of the fiber, not the ends. To get light exposure from optical fibers in a blanket, the blanket would have to be constructed like a pile fabric (such as a velour, or a terry fabric). There are two problems with such a construction. One is that optical fibers are much larger than fibers typically used in such fabrics, so they would be quite abrasive and uncomfortable. The second is that the required construction is usually made by cutting loops of fibers, in order to expose the fiber ends. So pumping light into a set of fibers would allow all the light to exit where the fibers first enter a loop that has been cut, and all the other lengths of fiber that had been part of the original fibers before cutting, would remain dark.-- beauxeault, Apr 15 2002 beaux, see ANI-Motion link for a potential solution to the problem you describe. This is one truly halfbaked company.-- waugsqueke, Apr 15 2002 Regarding the orientation of the optical fibers, there are now "side-emitting" fiber optics widely available that intentionally "leak" light out the sides so you can use them as accent lighting. I think these would do the trick.
One possible benefit of the "pile carpet" construction is that in addition to putting in light, you could also retrieve an image back out, in case you wanted to project what was going on under the covers onto the ceiling or such...-- spartanica, Apr 15 2002 random, halfbakery