Opalux Window Film Blog

When many end users and specifiers enquire to us about sourcing an Opalux window film, they may initially have in mind something with a very specific purpose. They might desire the best window film to reduce glare at their premises, for instance, or it may be the product that would be most effective at lowering oppressive summertime heat that is of most interest to them at first.

However, it is any one or more of the following benefits that you might actually receive from your final Opalux window film, depending on the product you ultimately choose.

Improved aesthetics

Window film can really help to provide a more uniform look to glass than might otherwise be the case. With both reflective and low-mirror products available right now from Opalux, we can help you to achieve the appearance – whether mirrored or muted – that you feel would best suit your own buildings.

Glare reduction

This is one of the most common reasons that prospective customers of ours have for requesting solar control film. Glare can be a menace that prevents the occupants of buildings from using premises comfortably and productively. This, in turn, could make window film to reduce glare a better alternative to such measures as blinds or having trees planted near buildings.

The rejection of heat gain

Both overly warm and overly cold environments can be less-than-optimal ones in which to work for people in offices and similar premises across the UK. Nonetheless, at this time of year, it is excessive rises in temperatures that are likely to be the biggest problem. A dedicated window film could therefore be greatly useful for repelling a large proportion of the heat that would otherwise imperil occupants’ comfort.

Enhanced privacy

While the change in appearance that Opalux solar control films often bring to the glass to which they are applied is in many ways simply a consequence of the window film needing a tint if it is to have solar protective properties, there’s another pleasant side effect that such tinting can bring: greater privacy for those inside the buildings. Our solar reflective films, for instance, are known for their silver mirrored external look during the day, which prevents those from outside easily peering through the glass.

Better safety and security

While making your buildings less vulnerable to the whims of wrongdoing intruders might not be your very first priority when you are in the market for solar protection window film, we certainly offer solutions here at Opalux that combine these qualities. We offer dedicated safety and security films, for instance, that filter out up to 99% of potentially harmful ultraviolet (UV) rays, while also being strong against attempts to break the glass, and helping to hold together shards of shattered glass if breakage does occur.

As you can hopefully see from the above examples, specifiers and end users with responsibility for buildings don’t need to limit themselves to purely seeking out the best-suited window film to reduce glare or heat gain.

Instead, multiple benefits can be offered by one product – and when you contact our technical department today, we can assist in directing you to the film that would represent the best match to your preferences and requirements. 

Glare, it is fair to say, is a real menace for many office workers and other occupants of commercial buildings. It can be an issue right through the year, but it is often as the spring and summer loom that end users and specifiers consider more formal arrangements for tackling it in their buildings – especially as it is during these seasons that excessive heat tends to become more of a worry as well.

There are various ways in which one may conceivably control the amount and/or impact of glare in a given interior space, including adjusting the light levels and rearranging where computer screens are positioned. Another option, though, is to look to dedicated glare reduction films.

Such window films provide a direct intervention between a window and an interior space to help to make troubling and distracting glare a thing of the past. What you might not have realised if you are interested in glare reduction films, however, is just how useful the leading ones can be in a wide range of other ways, including to enhance the appearance of a building, reject excessive heat gain, and maximise the privacy of occupants.

We have the window film that will suit your own setting 

Whether you are a specifier or end user, it is important to be aware of the very real differences between different glare reduction films, in light of your specific requirements.

The options that we can presently offer here at Opalux, for example, include solar reflective mirrored films such as the Reflective – Silver 20 (SO-20RS-iSR), which doesn’t merely reduce glare by 82%, but also rejects 78% in total solar energy, and filters up to 99% of potentially harmful ultraviolet (UV) rays. Such effects help to make a building’s occupants more comfortable, in addition to reducing energy tax liability and boosting their daytime privacy, thanks to the reflective outward appearance.

Alternatively, there may be a more architecturally sensitive setting in which you are interested in fitting glare reduction films, and where highly mirrored reflective films would be undesirable. In that case, the much more muted look of our low-mirror films is likely to be much more to your satisfaction. These films are still impressive in their performance, though, as in the example of the Lower Mirror – Neutral Grey 20 product (SO-20NG-iSR), which rejects 70% in total solar energy, transmits 18% of visible light and, of course, slashes glare by 80%.

Talk through your window film needs with our friendly and capable staff

We could cite similar examples of the multidimensional benefits of our glare reduction films right across our range – and if you would like to receive more tailored advice and guidance for your own particular needs, you are very welcome to contact our technical team directly. Give us a call today on 0845 026 1125 for an in-depth discussion, and to arrange a free survey and quotation. 

Glancing at much of our online window film range, it might be easy to think that here at Opalux, we only supply products for the purposes of repelling excessive heat gain, minimising glare, maximising security and/or enhancing privacy.

But that is not, of course, the case, especially given that we are also such a reputable source of glazing safety manifestation.

What do we mean by ‘manifestation’, anyway?

Manifestation is the name given to a type of treatment given to many glass surfaces – including glass windows, doors and partitions – in order to maximise their visibility. This, in turn, helps to prevent the users of nearby spaces colliding with the glass, and potentially suffering injury as a result.

We can be your trusted, go-to source of such film

Opalux Mani-Fest® window film is available in standard and bespoke forms alike, to match the most specific requirements you have for the intended setting.

Our standard manifestation, for instance, simply consists of frosted manifestation dots or squares that can be purchased ‘off the shelf’ on 50-metre rolls, or a continuous 50m x 50mm frosted strip.

There’s no more straightforward a way of satisfying the requirements of the Building Regulations and the Workplace Health Safety & Welfare Regulations, with regard to window or glass partition manifestation.

All that you have to do is follow the enclosed fitting instructions, pulling the length required from the roll and ensuring two bands of manifestation are applied to the glass surface in question, aligning with each other vertically, as well as horizontally with adjacent panels.

But we can also answer more demanding needs

If you have slightly more specialised expectations with regard to the glazing manifestation that you wish to purchase from a supplier like Opalux, you may be pleased to learn that we also offer manifestation on a bespoke basis.

This means that by negotiation, you can have Mani-Fest® 50-metre rolls created by us to your own specification. This service is subject to a minimum order quantity of 750 linear metres, and enables you to have manifestation produced that incorporates your own choice of repetitive mark or logo, within certain design limits.

In the event, however, that you would like to enjoy even greater design freedom than this, there is also the option of asking us about freeform manifestation.

Again, the basic purpose of such manifestation is to make the glass easily visible, and therefore safer, except that you will also have the utmost scope to introduce whatever imagery you desire to your building’s office partitions, windows and reception areas.

You’re just a few steps away from the ideal product

Window film in all of its shapes and forms is very much our speciality here at Opalux, and always will be! We’ve been serving end users’ and specifiers’ most discerning window film requirements since 1976, and we can do much the same when you are in the market for glazing manifestation.

Call 0845 026 1125 or email solutions@opaluxwindowfilm.com today, and you’ll be able to have the necessary detailed discussion with our technical department, to make sure we devise the most suitable solution together.

In a world in which more and more workers spend a considerable amount of their office time sat in front of and concentrating on a computer screen, glare can be a sometimes surprising compromise to productivity levels.

Even worse is that it is not, contrary to popular belief, an issue that only ever arises during the summer; it is the winter months, after all, when the sun tends to be low in the sky during hours when the typical office staffer is still working.

Regardless, January marks a New Year, as well as the start of a steady transition to more spring-like conditions in the months ahead. This means your office-based firm may need to think increasingly urgently about ways of reducing glare, and putting the chosen solutions into practice before the summer arrives.

So, what could those solutions be?

Plenty of potential measures for reducing glare in an office have long been tried. You might have arranged for those employees of yours who wear glasses to swap them for spectacles incorporating an anti-glare coating, for instance, or you may have attached anti-glare screens to their monitors.

Another possibility could be to rearrange the layout of your office, so that any artificial light sources used in the space are not positioned in a way that makes glare more likely. It’s a similar situation for natural light, too, so ensuring none of the computer screens in your office are directly facing the window – which the sun may sometimes stream through – could be another very wise idea

Alternatively, perhaps you could simply fit some window blinds or curtains around your office? These are an affordable, fuss-free and ‘low-tech’ solution, but they can also collect dust. This is to say nothing, too, of the sheer inconvenience of your employees having to manually adjust them over the course of the day and week, in line with the light conditions at any one time.

There are good reasons why so many firms choose window films

Even if you have never considered using window film to reduce glare, here at Opalux, we can guide you to the product in our renowned range that represents the best match to your full range of requirements.

Window films make great sense as a means of lessening the amount of glare experienced by your workers in 2020. They enable your employees to continue appreciating the view through the glass, without having to continually intervene to ensure glare is actually still being prevented.

Furthermore, our window films are known for their impressive aesthetics and performance, the latter including not only glare reduction, but also the reflection of solar energy gain and the filtering of potentially harmful ultraviolet (UV) rays.

Why not, then, call the Opalux team now on 0845 026 1125, to talk to us in more detail about how the right window film to reduce glare from us could bring benefits extending well beyond glare reduction? When you do, we will also be able to arrange a free survey for you, and provide the most competitive quote you will find in this industry.