It’s been a while since we’ve taken a look at audio-reactive accessories and projects for DJs! For a fun Friday article, we thought it would be interesting to look at a few of the cutting-edge projects that are gaining traction and might bring innovative audio-reactive DJ lighting to the masses. Read on for more:
ViVi Music LED Controller
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1777925564/vivi-music-led-controller
This is a new Kickstarter that came across our radar earlier this month. Addressable (meaning every LED can be individually controlled) LED strips have become incredibly common in all kinds of lighting projects. The biggest obstacle to easily getting started using LED strips in DJ booths, art cars or home studios is usually the programming side.
On Kickstarter, Mat Kachur is crowdfunding a music reactive LED controller that lets you plug quickly plug in LED strips to the bass, mids, or treble output. The controller creates a dynamic lightshow unique for each part of the audio spectrum – unlike other typical audio reactive lights, it actually has patterns and adjusts the results based on the overall volume of the input (no adjusting a sensitivity knob every time the track changes).
Worth noting, this Kickstarter only has a few days left and is still a few thousand dollars short of their goal, so if you want to make it happen, pledge your support here.
Stickerlight: Laptop Sticker Lighting
For digital DJs, often the most prominent surface facing the audience is the backside of your laptop. But instead of giving your laptop manufacturer free advertising, what if you had a cool audio-reactive logo based on your own design? That’s exactly what Stickerlight does.
Stickerlights designed from your own custom logo will likely not be a cheap purchase, but we suspect plenty of DJs (particularly mobile) will find it to be well worth the investment.
Need a DJ logo? Read our post, DJ logo design 101, for our advice.
GlowHeadphones
This project is a bit more cheesy and less practical than the other two, but personally I’ve been waiting for a project like this to come out since I started DJing: audio reactive headphone cables:
Glow Headphones are earbuds – not exactly ideal for DJ use – and there’s not a lot of info on the actual quality of the drivers themselves (the purchase page says “Premium Sound using high-end Audio Drivers” – pretty unspecific) but it’s still a fascinating concept.
Right now the project is still in the preorder stage – you can lock in a pair of these audio-reactive headphones for $179. They’re available in Red, Green, or Blue colors, come with a carrying case, and will have a companion app that allows additional brightness control.
I’m less interested in this particular pair of headphones, and more interested in seeing other similar lighted audio cables that are developed in the future. What if all of a DJ’s audio cables had sound responsive lights in them – so you could see the signal from your left and right decks just by looking at your cables?
Have you seen an interesting audio-reactive DJ lighting project that should be added to this list?
Let us know in the comments and we’ll feature the coolest finds in the article!
