I'm new to Arduino so this may be a really silly doubt but I'm not finding an explanation for it anywhere online. I first uploaded this code (to blink 5 LEDs) on my Arduino Uno :

 void setup(){
 pinMode(12, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(11, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(10, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(9, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(8, OUTPUT);
}

void loop(){
digitalWrite(12, HIGH);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(12, LOW);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(11, HIGH);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(11, LOW);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(10, HIGH);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(10, LOW);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(9, HIGH);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(9, LOW);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(8, HIGH);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(8, LOW);
delay(1000);
}

The 5 LEDs glowed brightly. But when I uploaded the following code (using an if statement to reduce the size of the previous one), the LEDs glowed dimly.

int LEDpin = 13;
void setup(){
pinMode(LEDpin, OUTPUT);
}

void loop(){
digitalWrite(LEDpin, HIGH);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(LEDpin,LOW);
delay(1000);
if(LEDpin >= 8){
LEDpin--;
} else {
  LEDpin = 8;
  }
}

Also, when I just typed the if statement without the else part, nothing happened after the LED at pin 8 had glowed on and off. Can someone please tell me why the LEDs glowed dimly in the second one and why nothing glowed after LED 8 when I skipped the else part?