Shadowing & Silhouetting For Dramatic Ambiance

Lighting design is a beautiful art form that many people overlook when designing their perfect home. Outdoor lighting companies have been using dramatic lighting techniques for years in order to achieve stunning effects for their customers. Which techniques set a property apart from the rest?

Lighting Techniques

Some of the most dramatic techniques play with light and shadow to create breathtaking results. Houston Lightscapes relies on two techniques to elevate their customer’s lighting experience. 

Shadow Lighting

Everyone understands what a shadow is, but few people utilize this technique to achieve a curated lighting design. Hiring a professional lighting designer to work with your landscape can bring out the best in your property, and can highlight areas you never considered before. So, what is shadowing?

Shadow lighting involves placing a light in front of something and filtering the light to create dramatic shadows on a wall or background. In landscape lighting, this is especially popular when it comes to lighting trees and shrubbery, and sculptures. Different angles create different effects, and if a tree or plant is highlighted, the movement reflected in the shadow can be quite mesmerizing. This lighting technique can be used on plants around the perimeter of a house or business, or to highlight statues, fountains, and other features in a garden or backyard. The lower and more tilted the angle of the light is, the more drastic the shadow effect will be. 

Silhouetting

Think of negative and positive space. Positive space is what is in focus in an image or space. Negative space is the darker, recessed portion of an image or space. Both play an integral part in creating a complete image. Silhouetting plays on this approach by flipping it around and making the negative space the focal point. This is achieved through professional outdoor lighting techniques that work with light and shadow.

Silhouetting is done by backlighting a background, whether that be a house or a wall or a fence. This in turn makes the plant or feature in front of the background appear dark in contrast to the bright, white, well-lit background – thus creating the appearance of a silhouette of whatever is being highlighted. This ambiance lighting is perfect for adding drama and depth to a property. It works really well when highlighting unique plant life because of their often intriguing forms and structures. 

Add Drama To Your Property

There are many unique lighting techniques that outdoor lighting designers use to create ambiance and drama. Knowing your property and understanding what areas you want to place a focus on can help transform your home or business into your dream landscape lighting design. If you are unsure where to start, working with a professional lighting designer, like the ones at Houston Lightscapes, can help you identify these key areas you want to bring to life.  

Our designers will come to your property to perform an initial consultation and to install a temporary lighting design so that you can see, first hand, what silhouetting and shadowing can do for your home or business. Set up your free consultation today.