What Is EL Paint?
Let there be light! The next revolution in lighting is here… No longer bound to bulbs or panels, paint a surface and transform it into a light source that can be touched and even worn. LumiLor™ is an Electroluminescent (EL) paint that is transforming everything from advertising and consumer products, to architecture, transportation and urban infrastructure. The only limitations are the designer’s imagination.
EL paint is a type of painted coating, that when an alternating electrical current is applied, illuminates the surface on which it’s painted. EL paint is durable, safe to touch, environmentally friendly and long lasting. Unlike traditional lighting (incandescence), electroluminescence utilizes an electrical current to produce light, without the energy wasting by-product of heat. This allows the surface to emit light that isn’t hot to the touch, so no burned fingers like when touching a bulb. You’re also not constrained by having to create a fixture to house the light source. With EL paint, the fixture itself can become the light source, freeing you up to create radically new products.
Developed by Darkside Scientific, LumiLor can be applied to virtually any shape or surface. Spray LumiLor on wood, glass, metal (electrically insulated first), plastic or carbon fiber that can be crafted into complex or simple shapes, such as the body of a guitar, car panels, hand rails or a bike frame. Just use your imagination, spray on LumiLor, apply the current and light a new way forward.
Using either automated spray equipment or hand-applied by a professionally trained painter, LumiLor is essentially a basecoat of paint that emits light when charged. This allows additional coats of paint to be applied over it, so the design can be fully customized to the application and inspiration of the designer. Taking into consideration factors such as reflected color, shine, weather and impact resistance, the designer can determine which type of topcoat best fits the application and design goals.
When combined with a topcoat, your design can look “normal” when a charge isn’t being applied. Then, when the charge is applied, it’s transformed into a unique, lighted creation. The standard LumiLor is white, but green, blue, blue-green and orange LumiColors are also available. Using subtractive color mixing (where various colors’ properties are subtracted to produce a resulting new color), when LumiLor is combined with specific tints, just about any color can be created.
Ellumiglow.com has partnered with Lumilor to provide robust Smart EL Paint Inverters to automatically tune the paint to the proper frequency and voltage, eliminating the need for more costly and custom solutions.
