Lighting Ideas
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Architectural Lighting
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The work of an architect demands much more than contributing good ideas and suggestions. Architectural lighting is a very important part of his or her design. The architectural lighting design is required to generate the correct atmosphere. This is possible only though combining the use of hidden light sources, natural light and attractive fittings. The objective must be to devise architectural lighting that will permit the general architecture and interiors to make a spectacular and unforgettable space but without compromising on conservatism.
However, architectural lighting design must generally attend to practicability and cost as well as aesthetics. So, it can be said that the most essential feature of superior architectural lighting design is compliance to an established standard process. There are many advantages to following a process that has already been tried and tested.
First and foremost, if there is a standard process that can be adhered to, it makes the whole thing a lot simpler since it provides the architect with a framework to work from. If the established process suits your needs perfectly, there is not even the need to alter it. And if it does not fit your needs, then it can always be modified to fit your requirements. Also, if you’re a fairly new in the field of architecture, then you can always fall back on it.
The selection of light sources charts the practical traits of the architectural lighting design model and the restrictions to the lighting qualities that can be accomplished. The architectural lighting effects that can be achieved inside this choice depends on the selection of luminaires in which the lamps are to be used. Therefore, the first thing to keep in mind is that the selection of lamp and luminaire is strongly linked. Choosing a specific light source will diminish the options of luminaire, and vice versa.
So, you need to first complete the project analysis and build up an architectural lighting concept. The subsequent stage involves sensible planning; resolutions concerning the lamps and luminaries to be used, the display and setting up of the luminaries need to be made. And, a thorough design can be developed from an idea based mainly on architectural lighting qualities.
One architectural lightning quality that needs to be kept in mind is color. Color is an important constituent of visual observation. For this you have to keep in mind both artificial lighting as well as natural light. The right mixture of lamps and filters permits a crowd of design possibilities for accentuating or changing the architectural lighting effect of rooms and things with colored light. The term "color of light" includes both white and colored light. Warm white, neutral white and daylight white are colors resulting from the white color of light.
Another significant aspect of architectural lighting is that the choice of lamp for the luminaire is dependent on the actual lighting requirements. For the successful realization of a lighting concept the physical qualities, like color interpretation, and practicality are important. So, one of the architect's most important duties are to find out the application's practical requirements. This can be demanding because stakeholders are inclined to disagree. Marketing usually brings in a batch of requirements while the management is only interested in making sure that the development costs stay low. So, it’s up to the architect to negotiate these differences with the stakeholders and decide which necessities are crucial to the application.
Once you’ve a good idea of the requirements that need to be fulfilled, then it’s time to collect all the possible application constraints. Anything, from a company policy that states you have to use a certain database system to a set of architectural lighting guidelines for an existing product line, can qualify as constraints.
