Drag the time and watch the light change.
Drag the sun. Blue overhead means day; no blue means night. Your bulb should say the same.
It sits apart from the cells you see with and responds to the blue-cyan part of the light. The more of that light, the more “day” your body hears.
Daytime signal = melanopic daylight efficacy ratio (MDER, CIE S 026): how strongly a light talks to the body clock, with daylight = 1.
Your body reads the time from the light at your eyes: plenty by day, little in the evening, none at night. Run a day in this home and see where the light comes from, at the table, on the sofa and in bed, and what to change.
Your body reads more than brightness: it reads how much day is in the light, the blue-green part of daylight (scientists call the share MDER). Daylight is 1, a warm white LED 0.44, vitae at night 0.015. Signal = lux × MDER. The green shows how much your body wants: lots by day, little in the evening, none at night. The line should stay in the green.
Daytime signal = melanopic EDI at the eyes (CIE S 026): lux × MDER, the melanopic daylight efficacy ratio of the light, on the plane the face looks at. Recommendations: Brown et al., PLOS Biology 2022. The model: an equinox day in Prague under a clear sky; the window faces away from the sun; lamps are points with their shades: a Tolomeo Mini on the table, a Melampo behind the sofa and a Tolomeo Pinza clipped to the bed, none shining into the eyes. Ordinary LED: 2700 K (MDER 0.44, 470–1055 lm) in every lamp, plus a ceiling light. vitae: Home Office in the Tolomeo Mini (4000 K for work, 2700 K at dinner), Bedroom 2.0 in the Melampo and the Pinza (2000 K, 1600 K for reading from 20:00, orange 1200 K for the last quarter hour). Asleep at 23:00 under ordinary LEDs and at 22:00 with vitae, because melatonin rises sooner in dim orange light (room light before bed delayed it and cut it short by about 90 minutes in Gooley et al. 2011). The ceiling light is only in the ordinary-LED home: vitae is made for lamps near you, not ceiling lights. A sketch that shows the size of things, not a measurement of your home.
A phone 30 cm from the eyes gives more daytime signal than every lamp in the room. A red screen leaves out the blue and green the body reads as day. Set it up once, then switch it with three clicks.
Menu names change a little with each system version.
Flip the cord switch: a vitae bulb always wakes on its warmest, blue-free setting. Add a classic bulb, the sun or a fire from the shelf and compare. Watch the left of each spectrum, the band that tells your body it's daytime.
vitae from the datasheet; classic bulbs and nature are typical values. Bar height follows brightness. Day signal = MDER (noon sun 1.0, candle 0.2).
Most people feel it within a few nights: falling asleep comes easier, mornings come lighter.
“To deliver the best, we test what we make, keep up with the science, and occasionally lose a little sleep so you don’t have to.” Hynek Medřický, inventor of vitae
Put it in the lamp you use at night. Most people notice the difference within a week.
