What is "Full Spectrum" Light?

Fullspectrum Light literally translated means "the suns full light spectrum that reaches us on earth". Having evolved millions of years under this particular light, one would expect this spectrum to be ideal, balanced and healthy for the human mind and body. And surely it is: Everybody knows the difference of how we feel on a bright sunny day in comparison to the moods swings we encounter on dark grey days.

Our lives and working style has tremendously changed over the past 100 years. When previously most people were working somewhere outdoors – farmers for instance – exposure to natural daylight was common and absolutely normal. Of our daytime we spent around 90% outside and 10% or even less inside. Not so today:

• Professions and society has changed: Our working style is mostly indoors.
• Offices, homes, shopping centres etc. use double glassing and energy efficient building methods: They are almost completely closed and thus hermetically sealed.

As a result, we generally spend much less than 10% of our daytime outside and many of us are now unable to receive their daily dose of natural daylight including the full range of the suns spectrum. This we need not only for our daily dose of “good mood” but also on a pure physical level: Some parts of the suns full spectrum are essential for maintaining healthy and balanced body functions and are also controlling the release of hormones. Such parts of the suns spectrum are simply not included normal incandescent lamps, most energy saving lamps or tubes.

How we define Full Spectrum Light:

Now it is correct to point out that for example the ultraviolet range can be dangerous for the human but it should not be forgotten that everything depends on the dosage. An absolute minimum of not less than 15 minutes sunshine exposure is needed to get our daily dose of Vitamin D3 transferred into a usable form for our bodies. Unfortunately even this very minimal amount of time is not easy to achieve in todays industrialized society, possibly leading a number of chronic and widespread diseases such as for instance osteoporosis* .

The goal of Viva-Lite® therefore is to offer its customers a balanced source of light including a continual spectrum as possible, at a not too high, too low colour temperature and a colour reproduction as close to the sun as possible (Sun = 100).

We also want to point out that above mentioned criteria is an ideal view as per our present knowledge and that due to the nature of all fluorescent based lamps (especially point 3 - continous spectrum) there is always improvement which is why we focus our dedication on research of new Viva-Lite® based light technologies all the time.

How Viva-Lite® Full Spectrum Light looks like:

Below is a little demonstration of the difference between a Viva-Lite® full spectrum energy saving bulb and a standard warm white energy saving bulb.

Simply click on the ON/OFF buttons to get started:

ONOFF

 

Warm White, 2700 Kelvin

ONOFF

 

Viva-Lite Full Spectrum, 5500K        

Compare the effect on the lid object yourself:

Photo of painting taken under normal energy saving light.

Photo of painting taken with Viva-Lite® full spectrum lights.

Painting © and courtesy of  Wolfgang Neumann, Thank you!

A brief History about Full Spectrum Light

The original idea and need for Full Spectrum light goes back over 50 years: During the 20th century the US Navy was actively researching methods to combat diseases commonly appearing on submarines where there is no natural daylight exposure for the crew for many days, weeks – or even months. Ultimatively the NASA provided a solution by creating the first natural daylight simulating tubes with added d UV output to help the crew stay healthy even without actual daylight access.

Later it was Dr. John Ott who made himself a name with Full Spectrum Light when he was about to capture the growth of plants for a Walt Disney® production that had to be filmed indoors. Initially the plants would die because of not enough daylight exposure, eventually leading to the creation of a lighting range which was later named OTT Lights® specifically for this purpose.

In those early days few could afford the extremely expensive tubes that were simply made for such specific purposes only. Even today due to the high manufacturing costs involved for producing such special bulbs, these lights don't come cheap. Nevertheless the awareness of many companies as well as private individuals has changed, realizing nowadays that they can also make use of the Full Spectrum Light advantages and that the benefits which Viva-Lite® offer far exceed the higher initial investment. After all how many products can you buy that make such a difference in your life by just exchanging some light bulbs in homes or offices?

What's next?

• Read on about "Viva-Lite's Benefits" or
• Click here to enter the Shop...

We hope you enjoy your visit on the Viva-Lite® homepage and are happy about your Comments.

*for further independent information and research about the consequences of vitamin D deficiency, please see Dr. Holwick's homepage.