ok tbh I'm pretty impressed with myself. I haven't tried growing veggies indoors and I definitely haven't tried it like this. I read about people using garbage bags to grow potatoes and I was like well that should work in theory with anything. I also wanted to do it as cheaply and compactly as possible. The light was my biggest expense and I got such a bomb ass deal on them from Amazon that it was cheaper for me to buy the bigger light kit. (only about $150 shipped now). Right now I'm using the 600wt Metal Halide bulb with a reflector. I started it on 50% and it's currently on 75% power, but I think I'll be letting it go on full power after this weekend.
I chose to try an indoor grow because, being in a desert, the heat kills off most crops by summer even if they're in the shade on my balcony and they literally combust in the full sun. This makes fresh produce very expensive, like a dollar fucking fifty for a sweet pepper. At the same time, when you think of a vegetable garden you think of a big plot in a backyard, not the corner of a room that you have to use every day. So I decided to constrain the garden to a 3×2 area. This actually became a plus when I was putting it together because the densely packed garbage bags support each other so I can form them to whatever shape I need.
I started with 6 corn plants, 7 peas (I only planted six seeds so idk what happened there), and 8 peppers. These three grow in different ways (stalks, vines, plants) so make a good test for the system. As you can see, I laid down a tarp first and duck taped it about a foot and a half up each wall (the near side is a dresser) to keep the room clean.
The pea plants are climbing twine that's duck taped to the top of the wall. At this point I was over-watering the corn. The symptoms look exactly the same as under-watering, so at first I started watering more and one poor seedling perished. Four are still strong, and the fifth is doing okay.
These two are from this morning. The corn really took off when I stopped watering it lmao. The peas are ~3 1/2 feet tall. The soil mix I made is 1/2 Miracle-Gro potting soil, 1/2 eco compost (which is urban food and plant scraps and doesn't have an odor, no manure) and a cup or two of earthworm castings (which are a potent natural fertilizer that also don't have much odor and are suitable for indoor growing). This is a very light mix which helps the roots take advantage of all the space they have, yet it's strong enough to support the corn (for now… dun dun dun… I honestly have no idea if it will work lol). The soil depth is about 8 inches, a little less for the peas.
I'll post the fruits vegetables of my labor in about three weeksish (even if no one curr 
).
Then I want to try again with three different crops in the same area.