One of our customers created dramatic LED staircase lighting in his home using Warm White ColorBright™ strip lights from Flexfire LEDs. The strips were inserted into a routed channel along the staircase, and attached to a Honeywell programmable timer switch to enable automatic on/off at specific hours of the day. This installation adds aesthetic flair to staircases in both homes and commercial spaces, carrying increased safety benefits as well, particularly for the elderly and small children. In fact, according to a 2012 study published in Pediatrics magazine,  a child under the age of 5 is admitted to U.S. emergency rooms every six minutes as a result of staircase accidents. Smart, safe, and great looking – a winning combo for your home or office!   Choose one of our convenient Flexfire LEDs strip light kits to suit the appropriate brightness, length and color of your LED display case lighting project:                 ...

As one of its many artistic and technological innovations, the award-winning film Gravity employed an original solution to simulate the extreme lighting conditions found in outer space. Gravity’s unique LED Light Box was created by visual effects supervisor Tim Webber alongside director of photography Emmanuel Lubezki, and was critical in earning the 2014 Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. Standing 20 feet tall and 10 feet across, the Light Box featured 4,096 LED bulbs spread across 196 two-by-two foot panels. It was capable of casting nearly infinite lighting and color conditions, and images could be projected onto its walls. This served the dual purpose of properly lighting the actors inside, while also providing them with a visual reference for what their characters were seeing. In addition to providing stunning imagery, this innovative solution apparently helped enhance the actors’ performances. The film’s star, Sandra Bullock, spent a great deal of time acting alone inside of the Light Box, surrounded by projections of the sun, moon, and planet Earth. In a Digital Trends report, Bullock explained that being in the box was a creative stimulant that actually helped convey her character’s solitude. Where will LEDs turn up...

LED strip lights deliver extreme versatility in a compact, low profile package. Their customizability is popular with creative lighting professionals everywhere, and this popularity promises to expand greatly as LED prices continue to fall. Obvious applications for flexible strip lights include above cabinet and under counter lighting, and the list continues to grow thanks to increased product development and innovation efforts. Here, therefore, is a quick checklist of the top 5 concerns for lighting designers to compare and choose among different LED strip light products.   1. Lumens Per ____? Every project is different, so determine what matters most before comparing overall lumen output. Lumens per watt, for instance, is most important for LEED and energy-efficient installations, while others may be more concerned with lumens per foot, meter, or reel.   2. CRI Customizable LED chips can be configured to produce a wide variety of lighting conditions. High quality LED strip lights are now capable of producing a color rendering index of 90 and above, rivaling the top lighting options found anywhere on the market today.   3. Certification Choose products that are UL or ETL Listed (U.S. and Europe, respectively), and provide the appropriate LM testing information from the Illuminating Engineering Society to certify claims regarding things like luminous intensity and CRI.   4. Dimming Capability Whether through a simple wall switch or smartphone mobile app, clients want the ability to adjust their lights using a dimmer. Professional grade LED strip lights should be compatible with desired dimming options.   5. Quality of Components LED chip design, heat sink, and PCB quality are among the factors that differentiate one LED strip light from another. These affect light quality, degradation and longevity, not to mention product safety. Look for a supplier who stands by his...

This is just one of many fascinating questions being addressed at Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Lighting Research Center. It’s one of a growing number of similar ongoing studies around the world that are exploring the links between lighting and human health. This latest study in particular focuses on how light affects the body’s circadian system, which governs sleep and wake phases. The LRC’s Mariana Figueiro recently discussed the project on NPR Radio. The generally held theory is that bright white light with a bluish tinge is more stimulating, mimicking daylight conditions. Warmer, golden-tinged light, on the other hand, is more calming and prepares us for bed. Working with a geriatric psychiatrist, the researchers used this theory in an attempt to help sleep-deprived Alzheimer’s patients at New York’s Albany County Nursing Home. They fitted a tabletop with a flat TV screen emitting bright bluish light, hoping to simulate the effects of prolonged daylight exposure. This produced positive results, as patients spending significant time at the table are now back to regular sleep patterns, with an accompanying improvement in mood and behavior. On balance, light therapy experiments such as these are showing great promise for all sorts of human health concerns. The results will only improve as we move toward improved lighting technology and increased understanding of how it affects the human...

In one of the more creative LED strip light applications we’ve seen to date, one of our customers purchased and placed Flexfire LEDs on a remote control helicopter used for aerial photography, the Single Rotor 700 Class Photoship. The lights are used for orientation, to help determine which way the camera is pointed. This video details the use of Flexfire LEDs UL Listed UltraBright™ Strip Lights  in bright white, illustrating that they can easily be seen from up to 1,000 feet away even in bright daylight.  Importantly, our customer mentions having tried several different LED lighting products in the past, noting that Flexfire’s were the first to achieve the desired light quality and brightness. Check the video below to see it in action! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wpZQFIhAgE   Choose one of our convenient Flexfire LEDs strip light kits to suit the appropriate brightness, length and color of your LED display case lighting project:        ...