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12 July
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Facility Built In Up-lighting for your Wedding

Rob Alberti   |   Wedding & Event Lighting Ideas, Wedding Venues

Facility Built In Up-lighting: We have seen quite a few facilities installing their own uplighting.   Just because they can cook a chicken dinner does not make them a lighting expert.  It would be no different if they purchased DJ gear and said one of their wait staff would be DJing your wedding.   It’s not always the right choice for your needs.

Let’s break it down – placement is everything when it comes to uplighting.  The goal is to enhance the room’s architectural features.  If they install their lights so they are lighting up the window – exactly what will the light bounce off of to give you that color? It might make better sense to have uplighting highlighting the columns or corners for better color coverage of the entire room.

When we go in a survey a room for our lighting installation, we look for columns, entrance areas, light placement behind your wedding cake and head table.  We want to bring attention to certain items and others, like air walls – we would not light to draw attention AWAY from items.  We want to balance one side of the room to the opposite.   Many facilities will install lighting just on one or two walls and completely forget to do the balcony, inner wall columns or other important features to BALANCE THE ROOM.

See the image below – this is an example of a poorly balanced room.  The two columns are lit near the stage but then only 1 arch seems to be lit – leaving 3 others unlit.  Light seems to draw your attention TO THE DJ and not to the couple or the beautiful room.  What is up with the icicle lighting hanging off the rafters? The color temperature of the icicle lights, chandeliers are not going to match (LED v. incandescent bulbs)

Examples of Facility Built In Up-lighting

Example of poorly balance room lighting
Example of poorly balance room lighting

Here is a panoramic view of one of our recent lighting installations.  Notice the balance given to both the outer walls and the inner wall columns. You get complete coverage and color throughout the event space. No dead areas.

2014-03-29 19.16.02
Panoramic shot of OUR LIGHTING showing balance throughout room architecture

What’s The Deal With Facility Built In Up-lighting?

The other issue with many installed lighting – it just is not quality gear or it is not bright enough.  What happens if the built-in lighting DOES NOT WORK or a cable built into the wall fails?  With our lighting – it is all WIRELESSLY controlled.  If one light fails – the room does not go BLACK.  We can quickly swap out a light fixture or fix a cable issue and you will never even notice. That’s why we always have a dedicated light tech onsite during your wedding – not the room captain that has to call in their light installer on a busy Saturday night, who probably is an hour away from the venue! What is that going to do for the success of your wedding?

We were at a facility recently with built-in lighting – the lighting was NOT ON at the start of the reception.  It abruptly came on at the end of dinner – and then the facility cycled through about 6 different colors until they reached the blue color that the couple wanted.   It was like FLASHING THE LIGHTS on and off at the end of an event to signal people to leave.  A smooth transition from off to their color – faded in would have been acceptable.  The room should have been lit for that wow factor when guests first arrived.

For uplighting to be visually correct and so that you do not have to wait until it gets dark outside (sunset can be as late as 8:00 or 9:00 on your wedding day), a light fixture really needs high output.  A LUX rating of 10,000 or more (at 1m) is necessary.  Most entry-level lighting is only rated at 4,000 – 7,000 LUX.  That means – you will not see the color on the wall until it is pitch black outside and facility lights are turned WAY DOWN.

Our lighting is THEATRE GRADE high output fixtures with 13,000 – 35,000 LUX rating.   We have lit the outside of the building in broad daylight.

Our Lighting - Outside Stonework lit in broad daylight
Outside Stonework lit in broad daylight

Here is an example of what built-in lighting looks like – low output in daylight

Facility built in lighting during the day - no visual impact
Facility built in lighting during the day – no visual impact

What is the bottom line?  Know what you are getting into whenever you make a decision about your wedding.  There are always options and bringing in a professional lighting company is not much different in cost compared to built-in inferior lighting.  Make an impact at your wedding with our lighting.

Call Rob today at 413-562-2632 to learn more about what we can do for your wedding lighting needs or fill in the contact form below.

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