Easter Designs

Neon Crosses

David Williams from FBC Fountain City in Knoxville, TN brings us these glowing crosses.

For Easter 2015, their Creative Team wanted to do something a bit traditional but still bright and exciting. They had an existing cross above their screen and had built a black wall for their backdrop a few years ago. They built 2 10’x5′ crosses with LED strip lighting taped to the back.

They started by collecting old scrap wood from throughout their past projects. They hammered and distressed the wood using various tools, then painted each individual one black (to cover all sides while hanging). Then they let it dry.

They arranged the crosses with distressed side facing downward and used one 9′ long 4″x1″ board for the length and a couple of smaller pieces for the width; then screwed into black pieces.

Then they turned them over and barely brushed the face with white paint, making sure to have broad strokes to give it a “one big piece” feel. Let dry.

They turned them back over on their face and taped on the LED strip lighting (basically a creative pastor’s version of manna from the heavens…) along all the sides. Since they were putting it up against the wall, they chose to have the LED go along the back of the black pieces and not along the bracing. *This keeps folks from accidentally looking straight into it since it’s facing the wall and also gives a better glow. They tried both ways and liked that angle best.

They taped them at various places to ensure it would stay in place. Make sure to start your LED strip lights from the same place so you can run your power to one place.

They mounted them to the back wall at the two horizontal ends with 4 4″ screws each. Then they mounted the bottoms to the wall with 12 4″ screws. Lots of screws into the studs since it’s relatively heavy.

Here’s the materials they used:

1. Lots of old scrap wood. Around 80 or so feet altogether.

2. Black Wood Finish – $5

3. White Paint – $10

4. White 16′ LED Strip Lights (2 for each big cross, 1 for small cross, $11 each) – $55

5. Power Adapter 12v 3A (total of 3 at $10 each) – $30

6. 4-Way DC Splitter (total of 2 at $8 each) – $16

7. 12′ DC Extension (Very helpful for top cross, used 4 at $9 each) – $36

IMG_4769

IMG_4772

IMG_4773

IMG_4774

IMG_4775

IMG_4776

IMG_4790-4

NeonCrossesLayout

A Rocky Scene Taped Crosses

5 responses to “Neon Crosses”

  1. Betty Sipple says:

    That is just awesome!! Great Job.

    • Ah thanks so much! It has gone really well so far at FC! It’s probably our first truly multi-generationally enjoyed stage design! We’ve had everybody from students to folks in their 80s say they love it, which is definitely a rarity and definitely encouraging!

  2. M Sims says:

    Great, amazing look. Curious about the led strips… Are you able to change the colors?

    • David says:

      Hey sorry to take so long to reply! The ones we got were the cheapest possible so we aren’t able to change the colors. We more just use that color as the accent of our different light settings, so it blends well but does put constraints on overall movements. But I’m pretty sure you can spend a little more and get colored versions!

  3. Irene says:

    What did you use to mount LED tape to back of cross? It appears in the photos that the lights point out sideways rather than straight back as claimed . And the curves around the corners also suggest that.

Leave a Reply to David Williams Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.