Ever wondered how they achieved the beautiful evening settings in those great looking homes in architectural magazines. A major component is lighting. All the great furniture, paint, and fabrics go to waste if the wrong lighting is used. An intelligent lighting system gives you control over your lighting, enabling you to create those amazing looks and moods. You can adjust the appearance of your home and entryway's, coordinating interior and exterior lighting to create the perfect balance.

Types of Lighting

Lighting can be broken up into three basic concepts:

General illumination is lighting for general use, an example is the overhead lighting in the kitchen. This type of lighting can be quite versatile; you can change the look and feel of a room just by changing the lighting levels using dimmers. Dimming not only changes the amount of light, but also the color of the light. A 100W bulb dimmed to 75% has a much different light output than a 75W bulb at full power. The power usage is roughly the same, but the look is different. By changing the lighting levels of general illumination, you can eliminate harsh shadows, while adding a different mood to your room.

Task lighting is used for specific lighting purposes, typically to illuminate the work area. An example is recessed lighting in the kitchen over a work island. In a restaurant it may have relatively low light levels for general illumination, but augments that lighting with task lighting over each table, so the meal is easily seen. Each table gets its own pool of light, without flooding the room with light. You can use the same technique in your dining room or study, using task lighting to illuminate your favorite reading chair. Using less light (and power) to illuminate the same area means that you can also save money,

Accent lighting is used in areas where you want to highlight a feature, but don’t need the lighting to perform a specific task. These include highlighting artwork on walls, or lighting the area above cabinetry.

Example Scenarios

• Welcome Home: Upon your arrival home, turn lights on, disarm the security system and switch on climate control. The house comes to life with one button press.

  
  

• Security & Peace of Mind: Enjoy greater peace of mind. Integrate lighting and security to ensure your family's protection. During the evening your garden and the exterior of your home is bathed in accent lighting. As an unexpected visitor enters your property the lighting changes to light their pathway to your front entrance and a chime in the house announces their arrival.

  
  

• When you're away, create the illusion of being home, using timed lighting events. Automatically turn interior and exterior lights to full when the alarm is triggered.

• On retiring for the night, a button besides the bed in the master bedroom turns "Off" all unnecessary lighting and turns "On" the perimeter alarm.

  
  

• Home Theatre: When you sit down to enjoy an evening's entertainment in front of the TV, the lights in the room dim to a low level. When the remote is used to start the video or DVD playing the lights dim completely. After the movie has finished the lights slowly turn up again removing the eyestrain of having them come bright immediately.

  
  

Choices

While still available the rotary dimmer has very much been superseded. If you have multiple lighting circuits can you imagine twiddling knobs trying to set the perfect setting every time you wanted to watch the TV. Even worse having to cross the room every time you want to make a change.

Today's smart dimmers remove all of these problems. Multiple lighting circuits can be set to "ramp up", brightening slowly for a smooth effect that is much easier on the eyes. There is now no need for complex wiring circuits to control all these light circuits as these dimmers have the ability to communicate and co-operate. Each smart switch can be instructed as to which circuit or multiple circuits it is to control. It has the ability to learn your new preferences on the fly or to be temporarily overridden.Installing Home Theatre Audio

Also available are scene controllers, these devices can store multiple "scenes" so you can change the look of the entire room with one button press. One button might set the lights for dinner, while another sets the lighting for a party situation.

Changed your mind and you do not want to control a certain set of lights any more, and then have that switch reprogrammed to operate something else. The extractor fan in the bathroom for example. TRUE FLEXIBILITY!

The most important component of the system is the user interface - typically a button panel or touch screen. These are available in a range of colors and finishes, providing endless decor matching choices.

Existing homes can be retrofitted with this technology, but for the very latest technology the home will need to be rewired. In the past lighting circuits have been wired from the fuse/switchboard straight to a light switch and then may daisy chain to other switches. Each local switch would also have a circuit that runs to the light to be controlled.

Today's solution is different; each wall switch is wired to a "data circuit" with data cable that runs to electronic dimmer modules mounted in the fuse/switch board. Each lighting circuit now runs straight to the light it is to control. This data circuit can be connected to the home data network so lighting can be controlled via a PC, or remotely over the Internet. It is also specifically designed to interface with security, access control and other building controls such as air-conditioning.

This becomes an issue for the building designer as there are lots more cables running to the fuse/switch board and having these cables pass through the top of a wall cavity will remove the strength from that wall. I am aware of some homes that have had additional fuse/switch boards installed to help alleviate this problem.

For renovators or new homebuilders it is important to consider if this technology is for you. It is definitely the way of the future. There is no time better to have this type of technology installed, then while the internal wall cladding is yet to be put in place.

1 Touch staff members are factory trained by Clipsal on the Schnider / Clipsal C-Bus2 Home Automation Products