Have you ever thought about neon lights that can be customized without spending money? With the new Twinkly Flex, you can also have many smart functions.
Have you ever wanted your own customizable neon sign that saves trouble and money? What if you could complete any design in a few minutes and change it at any time? With Twinkly's new flexible RGB LED strips, this is now possible.
By installing RGB LED strips on tables, TVs, shelves and other invisible places, RGB LED strips are a great way to add color or accent to your room and home. The new Twinkly Flex hopes to go one step further by letting the light take center stage. They not only add color, but also become works of art.
"Traditional" RGB LED strips are now available at very cheap prices. I may have used at least ten different kits with different lengths and smart connection options. Today, you can find a 50-foot-long strip option with Wi-Fi, which can be paired with Google Home and Alexa for less than $15. For $100 and only 6.5 feet long, what makes Twinkly Flex so special? It turns out that they have several cool features that allow you to deeply customize their physical design and lighting patterns.
Unlike the more versatile white-label LED light bars, Twinkly has been manufacturing other RGB LED lights for some time, and light strings are the most popular. Flex uses the same smartphone application as well as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connectivity, allowing you to adjust individual LED nodes as needed. These RGB light bars consist of 192 LEDs, contained in a flexible white tube. It also has a long white power cord with an embedded controller.
If you are not that creative, or just want to set up these lights and work quickly, you can use the included installation template and choose from a variety of pre-installed or downloadable color effects to apply. Perhaps most importantly, these LED strips are installed in a white tube to evenly disperse the light, allowing them to display seamless colors, which means you can’t distinguish individual LED nodes like traditional light strips. This makes Twinkly Flex actually look like a neon light instead of an LED strip. If you are a content creator or want to turn your custom design into reality, then this is a great background kit.
Although thicker than those more traditional LED strips, Flex can actually adapt to very complex shapes, including tight circles and sharp corners. Flex can be installed and used in more creative ways to make almost any shape or design. Installation is relatively simple, but there are a few things to keep in mind. If you want to minimize potential damage to the wall, or want to change your design with maximum flexibility in the future, I have provided some suggestions that can help.
The kit includes mounting hardware with right-angle and angled plastic clips to allow the lamp to maintain the desired shape on the wall or surface. In the box, you will find a total of 16 clips (12 straight clips and four 90-degree clips).
If you wish to make more complex designs with multiple bends and angles, you may need additional clamps. The back of the clip (the side connected to the wall) has a flat surface that allows you to stick it on the included double-sided 3M foam tape. However, in my experience, this only works if you want to permanently attach the bracket to your surface. I mistakenly thought that these are similar to other 3M tapes that are easy to remove. When I tried to remove these for a new design, I discovered this.
The clip also has a small hole, you can use the attached nail to fix them. This will be easier to remove, but if you want to change it, it will still leave a hole in your wall.
If you want to avoid damaging the wall altogether, I found another installation solution. I did not install it on the wall, but used a poster board. After connecting Twinkly Flex to the board, I used 3M poster tape to connect the board to the wall. In addition to allowing me to move the lights flexibly when needed, it also helps to frame them as if it were a painting or poster.
You will also find two A2 size folded papers, when fully unfolded, there are two design templates on each side. You can choose between cactus, heart, musical notes, and the word love in cursive script. These designs show you the layout of where the mounting hardware needs to be placed. Even if you decide not to use any of these designs, it will give you a good understanding of how to use these clips and may help inspire your own designs.
My other worry about installing Flex is the white power cord, and then you must strategically try to hide it. If you put the dead point of the lamp on the wall, you will have a relatively long power cord running along the wall and skirting board or floor to the nearest socket. As someone who really likes to minimize exposed cables, this makes me really want the lights to be battery powered.
Using its clever smartphone app, aptly named Twinkly, you can pair light strips to customize colors, brightness, speed, effects, and animations.
After successfully pairing the light with the app and connecting it to Wi-Fi, you will be prompted to point the phone's camera at the design you created. During this process, the lights will flash in different colors for a while, allowing the application to map the location of each LED node. I found this to be very accurate. Even with some overlapping and more complex designs, the mapping process works well. By mapping your design, the preset effect will start and end in the correct position, and you can further customize it if you wish.
The app contains a large number of presets to choose from, from simpler ones such as breathing, strobe and monochrome, to truly creative ones such as flags, snakes, flashes, flashes and snowflakes.
In addition, there are more presets that can be downloaded and applied from the Twinkly Effects Store. These are free and can be downloaded and applied in just a few minutes. I found the choice here is more than enough. However, if you are really creative, you can completely customize any part of the design and use any effect you want. As mentioned earlier, you can get the required details here. In other words, I am happy to use these presets and switch between them.
Support Google Home, Alexa and Razer Chroma RGB integration. I can quickly add these to my Google Home account. However, at this time it seems that you can only control its color, brightness and turn it on or off. Setting a custom mode or effect does not seem to be available.
Although Flex looks best in a darker room, it is still bright in daylight. As a studio background, this works very well for me. I like to be able to make any design I want, and then be able to customize it with a variety of effects. You will never get bored with these anytime soon.
That said, the somewhat difficult installation (if you don't want them to be permanently attached to your wall), and the lack of a built-in battery is really a hindrance to me because it limits where and how I want to place these. In addition, when I want to try more complex designs, 6.5 feet sometimes feels a bit short. Although you can pair multiple Flex kits together, they cannot be physically connected and use the same power cord.
Another quirk is that the built-in controller only seems to allow you to turn on the lights and change modes, but it doesn't actually turn them off. If for some reason you cannot access your smart home controller, the only real option to turn it off is to actually unplug it from the wall.
Currently, there are not many other LED strips like Flex on the market. Although Twinkly Flex is relatively expensive, it does provide very unique features and customization that other products do not have. With some planning and a little creativity, you can create truly unique artworks.
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Technical critic, YouTuber and video producer, specializing in professional cameras and audio equipment. When he is not out to shoot or edit, he usually thinks about ideas for the next project. Reach out to say hello or discuss future opportunities!
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