Principals of light

Principals of light and luminance

Learning the different terminology of lighting can be an intimidating task at times, and even more so when attempting to create a lighting scheme. The following are some of the common terms and meanings.

Beam Angle or Spread: The shape of the light emitted from the bulb and its reflective properties are known as beam angle or beam spread. This is often expressed in angle measurements and can be generalized as being wide, normal, or narrow.

Color Rendering Index (CRI): CRI is a scale of 1 to 100 used to determine how the light will expose the color of an object. Sunlight is the reference point and is 100 on the CRI scale. The closer to 100 the lighting the closer to the color an object will appear to the human eye. The lower the CRI the more distorted an object will seem.

Color Temperature: This is often used to appearance of color in light. This is measured in units called Kelvin and is often expressed as K. When a light source is below 3200 K the source is considered warm and produces a reddish tone. At 4000 K and above are considered cool and produce bluish tones. Retail and offices are often 4000 K, homes are often 3000 K areas, and 5000 k areas are often reserved for operating rooms and jewelry stores.

Compact Fluorescent (CFL): The term CFL is used in reference to fluorescent lighting that are used to replace incandescent lamps and are created with the intentions of doing such. CFL outlast an incandescent by about ten times and are much more efficient.

Foot-candle: Originally this was a unit used to measure how much light is going to reach something one foot away from a candle. Now this is considered the equivalent of a lumen, which is the lighting of a square foot.

Work Plane: Work plans are areas that are at least 30” off the floor. Lighting this area is important due to the fact that this is were most of the work gets done.

Many more definitions can be found on the Internet and you still may not be grasping what their terminology represents. Recessed lighting is dependent on spacing, and remember that after you have a layout and have visualized a pattern then it is time to properly lie out the lighting.

There are factors that are important to adhere to when designing a lighting plan.
1: type of lighting
2: color of lighting
3: spacing of the light
4: the type of fixtures is relevant to designing as well

Once a pattern is made the spacing of the lighting can be created. There are factors present in choosing the color of lighting for a room. Several factors can help with the selection of the color of a room. Fluorescent give off a blue light and don’t reach the high temperature that other lighting types do. Bulbs with the ability to produce many different spectrums exist and are often of a good quality some allow fluorescent to light a bit warmer. Incandescent can be considered a friendlier type of lighting due to the warm and comforting light they produce. They also cast a yellow over tone when they are sued to light a room. Whether or not this is a good thing is dependent on the person the room is going to be used by. The type of lighting can make objects look like different colors then they would in a different type. Using halogen lighting can be used to solve this problem.

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