Awesome Leds

Logitech’s Litra Beam LX is an all-in-one lighting solution for people who frequently stream or have video calls. Its front LED illuminates your face while preserving your skin tone. The rear RGB LED, on the other hand, is great for accent lighting. It has buttons for customization, and can also be controlled via Bluetooth or through Logitech’s desktop app.

Typical LED and LCD screens on watches and clocks use seven segments to create Arabic numerals from 0 to 9. Pekero came up with a design concept for a 38-segment display that can show Chinese and Japanese numbers and some letters as well. At the end, they show how it might look on a watch, and you can check out an SVG file here.

Fancyleds’ Fancy Sync Box has everything you need to enjoy ambient LED lighting on your TV. The receiver is available in single or three-port variants, with the latest model able to sync up to three HDMI 2.1 devices to the included LED strip. It supports up to 4K/120Hz output, variable refresh rate, as well as HDR, Dolby Vision, and Atmos.

Performance artist Manuel Spectacles shows off the latest tech for presenting persistence of vision illusions. Sold in pairs, LightToys’ 240-pixel Visual POI V5 MAXI uses densely-packed RGB LEDs and circuitry that displays a line at a time to produce complete images when spun. Check out LightToys’ official demo video, too.

There are kits you can buy that add colorful ambient lighting behind or around your TV. We’ve played with a few, but none of them have the pinpoint color matching of Chris Maher’s DIY setup. In this video, he shows how he built his edge-lit system using addressable LED light strips, a WLED light controller, and the insanely powerful SignalRGB control software.

This showy Bluetooth speaker has a cylindrical screen that displays song lyrics and other animations. The trick is a rapidly spinning LED bar that produces a persistence-of-vision illusion. Its see-through display can be viewed from any angle, and its audio system incorporates two full-range drivers and a subwoofer.

This cool, single-purpose device connects to your phone and displays album art. Instead of a standard screen, it uses a grid of 4096 individual RGB LEDs to create artful, pixelated images. It works with iOS and Android devices and is compatible with Spotify, Apple Music, Sonos, and last.fm.

It’s easy to find LED grids that can be programmed to display animations. So this build by Dr. Tõnis Gadgets that uses fiber optics to direct light into a smaller matrix seems unnecessarily complicated. It still looks cool, like something out of the engineering lab in a science fiction movie. The display was inspired by Elliotmade’s fiber optic display from Instructables.

There are a number of LED light curtains on the market, but Twinkly’s is the most densely packed with RGB lights we’ve seen. The result – more detailed patterns and animations. It uses a mobile app to display custom images and can also mirror a Windows PC screen. Available in 3.3 x 3.3-foot and 1.6 x 7.9-foot versions.

Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) are found everywhere these days, so they must be produced in mass quantities. Scotty Allen from Strange Parts scored a tour of China’s World Semi factory for a fascinating look at how they crank out millions of RGB LEDs that can be programmed to change colors. The automation used in the process is truly incredible.

There are some pretty cool backpacks on the market with LED screens, but this one from Yihong Technology works its visual magic differently. It uses a spinning fan blade with 510 flickering LEDs that display moving images using a persistence of vision illusion. It’s just for advertising and not carrying things, though.

Ivresse Films shot this awesome promo spot for Decathlon ski and snowboard brand Wedze. Filmed in the wee hours at Saint Gervais Mont Blanc, they captured video of three skiers heading down the slopes with LED-wrapped skis and poles. Check out the behind-the-scenes video for a look at the post-production work.

This 15″ tall, outdoor-friendly speaker from Monster can run for up to 24 hours on a charge. It cranks out big volume with 80 watts of amplification, a 5.25″ subwoofer, and a 2″ tweeter. A full-color LED panel behind its grille offers six lighting effects that react to music. Connect two for stereo sound.

We recently got a look at Sean Hodgins’ unique (and dangerous) spinning Christmas tree that creates the impression of a tree using lights and a persistence of vision illusion. After fans asked him if it could be programmed to play DOOM, he posted this video demonstrating the tree’s ability to be used as a gaming display.

We’ve seen a lot of cool custom guitar builds over the years, but we’re particularly enchanted by this one. Woodworker Ray Whitby created this beautiful and unique electric guitar from layers of wood and epoxy resin, cut into chevron shapes, assembled and shaped into the guitar’s face, and backlit with LED lighting.

LCDs and LEDs are everywhere, from smartphones to watches to TVs, to headlights. Musician and tech enthusiast Posy dives deep into one specific use of these technologies – displays which use segments to create numbers and letters. After a little history, he shows off some concepts for his own segmented designs.