Camping Lantern

Camping is something I look forward to every summer, and having a good lantern can be very important. This Instructable will walk you through the design process of my rendition of the ideal camping lantern.

• Autodesk Fusion 360
• Autodesk Sketchbook
• Adobe Photoshop
• Adobe Illustrator
• Adobe InDesign

There are so many different kinds of lanterns you can get for camping. From ultralight collapsible lanterns that are perfect for backpacking, to large fuel-powered lanterns, and everything in between. I've used a number of styles over the years, and had an ideal size and use case in mind for mine. Small enough to hang inside of a tent and clip onto a backpack, but large enough to be your primary source of light. I also have a tendency to use my camping lanterns outside of their typical use case, like under the hood of a car while working on it, so it needs to be adaptable and rugged. I usually camp in dispersed sites, far from others and cell service, so having an SOS lighting mode and solar power is also something I value.

For this project, I will design a lantern used for camping. It will be a medium size and designed with minimalism and use-case in mind. The lantern will use a warm white LED, as well as having a red LED in both solid & SOS modes. The lantern will be charged via. solar, have a backup port for manual charging, and use an elastic cord for carrying and hanging.

Here is some inspiration I took for this project.

Here are some quick thumbnail sketches as I explored the form and user interaction with different types of lanterns.

Here are my initial prototypes that helped me decide on a form. This was one of those projects where you hit a wall and need to get something physical in your hands. I took some time to put each of these through their potential use cases and ultimately decided on the smaller of the two. The larger hex shape really piqued my creative interest, however, and I would like to explore that form more on a different lighting design project.

I knew I wanted to keep the overall form of the lantern very simple and minimalist, so the modeling was easy and I was able to focus on the small details.

Step 1 was to model the base, that would house the electronics, LED's, etc. After the initial form was done, I explored numerous different styles, shapes, and placements for the On/Off switch, battery level indicator, solar panel, and charging port.

Step 2 was to model the top of the lantern, pretty straightforward.

Step 3 was to figure out how I could hang this lantern. After some exploring in Fusion, I decided I wanted a very simple and robust solution, that did not add any moving parts, joints, etc. Adding a through slot in the base allows for an elastic cord to slide through, and now the lantern can hang inside a tent, on a backpack, etc. with ease.

The battery level is displayed as a ring around the On/Off switch. There is a backup port hidden on the side of the lantern so the user can also manually charge their lantern up, if solar is not an option. The lantern features a solar panel for charging and elastic cord to carry or hang.

Light Modes:

• White - Low
• White - High
• Red - Solid
• Red - SOS

Some of the ideal use cases I wanted the lantern to adapt to, while being primarily focused as a camping product.

Here is the final prototype of the form. The next step is to make a functional prototype, which is currently in progress.

Overall, this was a very fun design project because it ties into something I am very passionate about - camping! I can't wait to get a functional prototype working and take it out on a camping trip to put it through its paces, and learn what can be improved.