Before/After: Hot-Tub Night Lighting & Audio Setup For Pinterest Photos

Scroll through any board of cozy spa nights and the pictures look the same in the best way: dark sky, warm bulbs above, water glowing from inside, steam lit from below, two drinks within reach and no phone in sight. It is the same mood that has made dim, wood-and-candlelight “sauna-core” rooms so popular – and a hot tub can get there faster than a sauna can, because nothing about it has to be rebuilt.

Most backyard tubs do not look like that at night. They look like the “before” below. The gap between the two is six small changes, all of them accessories, and each one is the reason one part of the picture changes. They run in order, from the light above the deck down to the drinks at the edge.

Before: the tub that only looks good in daylight

Go out to the “before” tub after dark. The porch floodlight is the only light, so the deck is bright white near the house and black beyond it, and the steam is invisible. The water is a dark hole, or, if the tub has a built-in light, a hard blue that makes skin look cold. The phone is on the ledge, playing music through its own speaker, its screen lighting your face every time a notification comes in. The drinks sit on the edge in whatever glasses were nearest.

Try to take a picture of it. The phone either turns the scene into a black rectangle with one blown-out lamp, or pushes the brightness until it is gray and grainy. It is a perfectly good tub. It just does not look like the evening it is.

Step 1 · Switch the floodlight for a canopy

Before: one bright lamp on the wall, aimed down, lighting the deck like a driveway.

The change is a ceiling of small, warm lights instead of one strong one. A strand of Edison-style bulbs strung above and around the deck does it: the Brightech Ambience Pro is 48 ft (14.6 m) with 15 LED bulbs of 2 W each, 3 ft (0.9 m) apart, in 2700K soft white – the color of candlelight rather than daylight. In a photo those bulbs become the round, soft blurs that make a night shot look deliberate rather than accidental.

• Hang it high and to the sides – along a pergola, a fence top or between two posts – not low over the water.
• Swag it in shallow curves rather than pulling it tight. A gentle sag reads as cozy; a taut line reads as a construction site.
• Add a dimmer if you can (it is sold separately). Fifteen bulbs at full power light a small deck more than a soak needs.

After: the floodlight goes off, the deck turns gold, and there is something to see above the tub as well as in it.

Safety: this strand runs on 110 V. Plug it into a GFCI-protected outdoor outlet that is well away from the tub – US codes commonly ask for at least 6 ft (1.8 m), and many local codes for more – and keep the plug, any connections and extension cords out of splash range and out of reach of anyone in the water.

Step 2 · Straighten the line

Before: the strand hooked over a nail, a gutter and a chair back, sagging in three different places.

A canopy of lights only looks good when the line is clean. The Command outdoor light clips are small clear hooks on water-resistant strips: one every 2 ft (60 cm) along a fence rail, a soffit or vinyl siding, and the cord sits in one tidy run without a single screw. They are about 1.25 in (3.2 cm) tall and clear, so in the dark they simply vanish. The maker rates them for 15 to 125 °F (−9 to 52 °C).

• Clean and dry the surface first, and wait an hour after sticking before the lights go on.
• They are for smooth surfaces – doors, flat siding, soffits, finished fences, tile, windows. Rough cedar, brick and cement board need screw hooks instead.
• Count before you start. One pack of 20 covers about 40 ft (12 m) at the maker’s spacing; a 48 ft strand needs about 24, or a post to carry part of the run.

After: the bulbs hang in an even line, and the frame has a clean edge of light instead of a tangle.

Step 3 · Light the water from inside

Before: a dark tub, or a built-in light stuck on hard blue.

The water is the center of the picture, and right now it is either black or cold. Lighting it from below changes everything at once – the water glows, and the steam rising from it catches the light. The Qoolife submersible lights are two sealed puck lights about 3.3 in (8.4 cm) across, battery powered with a sealed magnetic charging port, and one remote sets both to one of 25 colors at once.

• Fix them with the suction cups, low on a smooth wall, away from the jets, the filter and the skimmer.
• Pick one color and leave it. A warm amber or soft white looks like firelight in the water; the rainbow modes look like a pool party.
• Keep the remote on the dry side. It is not waterproof.

The listing names spas among the uses but gives no temperature limit for hot water, so treat these as lights you put in for the evening and take out afterward.

After: the tub glows from inside, and the steam turns into a soft column of light above it.

Safety: only battery-powered lights made for water go in the tub. Never put a plug-in light, a charger or a cable in or near the water, and charge the lights indoors once they are dry.

Step 4 · Add points of light on the surface

Before: a glowing tub with nothing on the water – lovely, but flat.

Photos need a few small, bright points to give the eye somewhere to land. Two small orbs drifting on the surface do it better than one big light. The LOFTEK 3-inch balls come as a pair, about the size of a tennis ball each, with a frosted shell that softens the glow and one remote for color, brightness and an auto-off timer of up to 120 minutes.

• Set both to the same warm tone as the underwater lights – one color family across the whole scene is what makes it look calm.
• Let them drift. They collect near the edge, which is usually where they look best anyway.
• Lift them out before the cover goes on. They are rated IP65, for floating and splashes, not for sitting under a closed cover in steam all night.

After: two soft dots of light ride on the water and double in its reflection – the detail that makes the picture look composed.

Step 5 · Move the music off the phone

Before: the phone on the ledge, a tinny speaker, a bright screen, and a wet case.

The phone is the one object that spoils both the evening and the photo: its screen is the brightest thing in the scene and it keeps pulling attention back to itself. A small waterproof speaker lets it go back inside. The JBL Clip 5 is rated IP67, has its carabiner built into the body, and the maker lists up to 12 hours of play, plus up to three more with Playtime Boost.

• Clip it to a rail or a post slightly behind the seats, at shoulder height – close enough to play quietly, high enough to stay out of the water.
• Start one long playlist, then take the phone indoors. If you want a picture, take it from outside the tub, and put the phone away again.
• Keep the volume low enough to hear the water. The neighbors’ evening counts too.

The listing does not say the Clip 5 floats, so it hangs beside the tub, not in it.

After: the music comes from somewhere behind you, the ledge is empty, and no screen lights up the steam.

Step 6 · Give the drinks a place

Before: two glasses on the tub edge, one elbow away from the water.

The last change is the one that shows up in every cozy-spa photo: two drinks at the side of the tub, in a place made for them. The Star Splash table tray clamps to a tub wall 3.5 to 7.5 in (9 to 19 cm) thick with a knob – no tools, no drilling – and gives you a 17 × 10 in (43 × 25 cm) top with two cup holders, rubber pads and drainage holes.

• Measure the tub wall before you order. The maker says it fits most hot tubs but not most pools, in-ground spas or inflatable tubs.
• Mount it by the seat you use most, on the side away from the steps, so nobody climbs past it.
• Use lidded tumblers, not glass. A broken glass in the water usually means draining the tub to find every piece.

After: two drinks sit within reach in the warm light, and nothing on the edge is about to fall in.

Safety: hot water and alcohol are a poor mix. If you drink, keep it to one small pour, have water alongside, and never soak alone after drinking.

After: the same tub, a different picture

Go out to the “after” tub. The floodlight is off. Above the deck a line of warm bulbs hangs in soft curves along the fence, held by clips you cannot see. The water glows amber from inside, and the steam rising from it glows too. Two small orbs drift near the edge, doubled in the water below them. Music comes, quietly, from a small speaker clipped to the rail behind you. Two lidded tumblers sit in a tray at your elbow. The phone is inside.

Nothing about the tub has changed. It is the same shell, the same water, the same yard. What changed is where the light comes from and what is left in the frame – which is all a night photo really is.

Safety: keep the water at or below 104 °F (40 °C), the upper limit most tub makers set, and get out if you feel dizzy or too hot. If you are pregnant, have a heart condition or take medication that affects blood pressure, talk to your doctor before using a hot tub. Children need an adult within reach at all times, and the cover goes back on, locked, at the end of the night.

Taking the picture

• Shoot in the blue half hour after sunset, when the sky still has a little color and the lights already show.
• Use your phone’s night mode or a small tripod, and hold still for the full exposure. Steam and bulbs both blur if the phone moves.
• Shoot from the side, a little above the water, with the bulbs in the top of the frame and the tray at the edge.
• Turn the jets off for the picture. Still water reflects the orbs and the bulbs; churning water just looks white.
• Then put the phone back inside and get in.

Keeping the “after”

• Lift out the orbs and the underwater lights at the end of every night, rinse them in fresh water, let them dry and charge them indoors.
• Bring the speaker in to charge, dry, and unclip the tray if the tub sits unused for a while.
• Check the clips after rain or a hard frost and replace any that let go – the pack has spare strips.
• Switch the string lights off at the outlet, not just at the dimmer, when the night is over.