How to Choose Home Theater Lighting
From an entire room designed as a home theater, to a simple living room you'd like to serve multiple functions, the right lighting sets the mood and creates the movie theater atmosphere. Choosing the right lighting and light bulbs is essential for watching movies without causing eye strain or headaches. It plays an even bigger role when the room serves multiple purposes, such as a living area. Lighting designed to accommodate each task will create a successful home movie theater. Does this Spark an idea?
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Things You'll Need
- Overhead lighting
- Floor or table lamps
- Wall sconces
- Accent lighting
- 6,500K light bulb
- Incandescent light bulbs
- Halogen light bulbs
- Fluorescent light bulbs
Instructions
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Sketch a layout of your home theater including where the TV or screen is and where all the furniture is located. Indicate the direction each piece of furniture will face. Circle any areas that will serve other purposes, such as a reading area used during the day.
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Choose overhead ceiling lights to create the room's ambient light---the lighting used to illuminate the entire room during general use. Consider track or recessed lights for this task. They provide a glow bright enough to light up the room without overwhelming the space. Track lighting fixtures can also rotate.
Position a recessed light over each seat in your home theater to create individual lighting for each person. Add separate controls to dim or brighten each light.
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Choose floor or table lamps for areas that need adequate light when the home theater is not in use.
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Place wall sconces with dimmers in a row along each wall to provide a gentle glow during a movie and overall lighting afterward.
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Choose small, bright light fixtures that point downward to serve as accent lights above artwork, posters or decorative architectural elements in the room.
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Place a small lamp or wall-mounted light fixture on the wall behind the TV screen. According to Brett D. McLaughlin on Cnet.com's "Insider Tips," this creates soft backlighting and prevents eye strain that can occur when watching TV in a completely dark room. Cnet recommends choosing a bulb of 6,500K, which will match the light quality of a calibrated TV. Mount the light fixture low enough that the TV screen blocks it from view.
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Pick incandescent light bulbs to create a warm glow in the room, halogen bulbs for crisp accent lighting and fluorescent bulbs for lighting large areas. Halogen bulbs work best for lights positioned to show off a poster or other piece of artwork in the room. Fluorescent bulbs work for overhead lighting, though incandescent bulbs will create a warmer color. Vary light bulb type based on the lamp and its uses.
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References
- Photo Credit Plasma panel image by Nikolay Okhitin from Fotolia.com
