The Astera AX1 Pixel tube lights have been one of our favourite additions to our lighting kit over the last couple of years. They give a very specific style, but the style is so cool it's worth planning your shoot around. They have been incredibly popular for music videos over that time, but also add amazing visual effects to events and stage shows.
Our sets include 8 LED tubes of RGB (well, AsteraRGB to be precise, their own custom-designed format) which can be set to various solid colours or colour patterns, or you can be more complicated with a downloadable app, allowing you to create a huge range of possibilities, with interchanging colour patterns, fades and effects, either in groups or each individual tube.
Each tube is 103cm (40.7”) long and weighs less than 1kg, and only draws 28W of power, meaning it's rechargable internal battery can be configured to run for up to 20 hours. Obviously the longer it runs for the more limitations you have on brightness, but it makes it great for visual effects for events, knowing they can be set up at the start of the day and will run all day until the close.
Whilst most people use the small base stands and rig them vertically from the ground upwards, they are so lightweight (less than a kg) there are plenty of other options – suspending from above or clamping onto stands or truss at various angles.
The frequency can be adjusted between 200 Hz and 1205 Hz to suit different frame rates, and LED technology means they should (according to the manufacturer) always be flicker free.
If you are looking for something cool, stylish and add a bit of colour to your backgrounds, these lights could be just what you need.