Personally I do not like the way the typical porch light directs light, I understand the reason for the designs and how difficult it is to design a fixture that shines down and does not stick out horrifically. We don't sit out very late and so lighting up our whole "patio area" is not important to us. When the campfire goes out we go in.
We want light when we approach the door that illuminates the steps and area around the steps. On our last rig I installed a 12", waterproof strip of amber LEDs under the bottom of the door threshold that illuminates the top step, that was controlled by a little 12volt remote switch or relay.
Today the remote switches come in a very large variety of functions and control up to ten or so on-off relays and amber LED strips are enclosed in plastic fixtures. There are also several approach sensors available that can be used to do a variety of things.
I like to tinker and don't like bright lights while camping so it works for me, some folks sit outside a lot more than we do and want patio lighting, there are more and more configurations of LED strip fixtures and approach sensors and remote controllers. We have the typical Tri-Mark entry handle and I hate not having a light to illuminate the key slots, gotta work on something for that so it illuminates the slot but doesn't shine in my eyes and looks like it is part of the door lock.
"I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to go". R. L. Stevenson
David Bishop
2002 Winnebago Adventurer 32V
2009 GMC Canyon
Roadmaster 5000
BrakeBuddy Classic II
