Table of Contents Hide
- 1 Unobtrusively Hugs the Ceiling and Radiates Light Softly
- 2 A Flush of Visual Charm
- 3 The Ambient Layer of Light
- 4 Conventional Designs
- 5 Uncover New Design Possibilities with LED Lighting
- 6 Types of Flush Mount Ceiling Lights
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7
Light Quality
- 7.1 Flicker
- 7.2 Spectral quality
- 8 Human Centric Lighting
- 9 Smart Lighting
Unobtrusively Hugs the Ceiling and Radiates Light Softly
Breathe new life into your home decor with a fascinating flush mount ceiling light. A showstopping focal point in a residential space isn't always about sparkling pendants and grand chandeliers. A flush mount ceiling light is an overhead lighting fixture that unobtrusively hugs the ceiling and radiates a soft diffused glow that fills your room with a welcoming ambience. Flush mount lighting creates engaging illumination that adds to both the visibility and atmosphere of the space. Featuring a low profile design, flush mount lights offer an adaptive architectural presence without overpowering the surrounding decor. Bringing both style and shine to your space, flush mount lights find their place in living rooms, foyers, hallways, bedrooms, kitchens, bathrooms and home offices.A Flush of Visual Charm
Flush mount lighting offers a nice compromise between low-hanging pendants and recessed ceiling fixtures for interior spaces where the ceiling height is 8 feet or less. Low ceilings can be tricky because they cannot accommodate the steep vertical space requirements of pendants and chandeliers while recessed ceiling lights fail to make a great visual statement. Flush mount light fixtures are surface mounted onto a ceiling with little or no space in between while protruding from the surface of the ceiling to establish a compelling presence with an intriguing design. This means these low profile fixtures work well as the ceiling centerpiece where pendant lights would interrupt aesthetic balance and room functionality in low ceiling buildings such as an apartment as well as in small interior spaces that only need one layer of lighting, such as closets and laundry rooms. However, flush mount lighting does not necessarily mean to serve low ceiling heights only. Large flush mount ceiling lights with decorative accents create an eye-catching focal point as well in foyers and entry halls.The Ambient Layer of Light
The best design comes when there's a balance in light composition. Multiple layers of light offer the right blend of ambient, task and accent lighting to maximize the livability and give visual interest to an interior space. Flush mount lighting contributes to the ambient layer of light which provides a room with overall illumination for safe interior navigation and comfortable visual recognition. Ambient lighting also sets the mood of an interior and evokes favorable emotional responses. Flush mount ceiling lighting provides a central source of ambient light that illuminates the whole room uniformly. In order for the centerpiece to do wonders to define the space just below the ceiling, the flush mount ceiling fixture should provide visually pleasant volumetric lighting to fill the entire space with generous amounts of glare-free illumination that provides atmospheric comfort and cosmic ambiance.Conventional Designs
Limited by its low profile design requirement, flush mount ceiling lighting did not have opportunities for creative expression as abundant as pendant lighting in the times of incandescent and fluorescent lighting. And its optical design had been remained the same. Traditional ceiling lights typically come in dome, square, drum, and bowl shapes. The light source is hidden behind a translucent shade typically made of glass, acrylic or fabric. The lamp shade is the commanding ornamental element. Frosted, alabaster, etched, frosted, seeded, stained or decorative glass shades show off distinct luminous beauty and aesthetical appeal. Acrylic and polycarbonate shades provide top-of-the-line diffusion properties and a clean visual look. Fabric shades invites a more elegant flair and pair well with stately classical themes. Lamp shades are supported by a decorative frame crafted from steel or aluminum and finished in chrome, nickel, silver, white, bronze, brass, brown, golden or pewter to provide a charming accent.Uncover New Design Possibilities with LED Lighting
Along with high energy efficiency and long operation life, LED technology opens up new design possibilities for flush mount lighting which were previously not available with conventional lighting technologies. The compact, miniature and solid state LED emitters allow lighting designers to remove the cumbersome light bulbs from the fixtures and create more striking designs and architecturally adaptive shapes. While flush mounts are still considered a more functional addition to the layered lighting schemes, more design personalities and artistic expressions are exuded by a host of designer light fixtures. LED lighting doesn't just invite indigenous lighting designers to exercise their creativity, it also ushers in optical engineering innovations for a whole new level of visual comfort and luminous wonder. With cutting edge optical designs such as edge-to-edge illumination, internal reflection and refraction, flush mount LED ceiling lights can offer exceptional visual experiences that heighten perceptions in a profoundly pleasant way.Types of Flush Mount Ceiling Lights
Flush mount LED ceiling lights present themselves in variety of designs and fall within these categories based on their light source integration and optical architectures.Edison bulb fixtures
This is basically a lighting retrofit that brings the benefits of LED technology to conventional fixtures by replacing halogen and fluorescent bulbs with LED bulbs. This is the simplest way to upgrade your lighting to LED while maintaining the fixtures' original look. For enthusiasts of clear lensed ceiling lights which captivate with the classic aesthetics of tungsten filament bulbs, they can retain the decorative look and feel of incandescent filaments while enjoying the benefits of energy-saving LED technology with the vintage-style Edison screw or candelabra base LED filament bulbs. However, LED bulb fixtures have poor dimmer compatibility and light quality since they use qualitatively controversial LED bulbs. Most LED bulbs available on the market have compromised color quality and dimming performance they generally incorporate the lowest quality LEDs and use the most simplified driving solutions.Direct-lit LED fixtures
This type of fixtures does not use light bulbs. Instead an LED board which is solder mounted with an array of SMD LEDs is incorporated in the fixture. The LED board directs light downward with discretely distributed LEDs providing a relatively uniform emission surface. Direct-lit LED ceiling lights have a higher optical efficiency compared with Edison bulb fixtures but require highly diffusive lenses to offset harsh LED illumination and eliminate hotspots. There's an increasing number of direct-lit LED ceiling lights which use Driver-on-Board (DOB) technology instead of AC-DC switch-mode power supply (SMPS). The DOB technology eliminates the use of bulky and expensive SMPS components such as inductors, transformers and capacitors. It uses MCPCB mountable power-regulation ICs to drives LEDs directly from a mains voltage without stepping this voltage down. The LED packages and driver components are mounted on the same PCB board thereby drastically reducing the form factor of the entire light assembly. Another benefit of DOB technology is improved system life since it does not use electrolytic capacitors, an energy-storage component in the SMPS driving circuit. However, there're tradeoffs for this technology and DOB LED ceiling lights are currently used in low cost applications. We'll explain this later in this article.Flush mount fixtures with novel optical architectures
High visual comfort and uniform distribution of light are critical to ambient lighting which is designed to establish a direct correlation between people and their environment. LEDs are directional light sources and produce high intensity spots that can be extremely harsh to eyes. Advanced optical systems find their applications in flush mount lighting. Edge-lit technology uses a laser printed light guide panel to refract luminous flux from the edge-mount light sources down towards a high-transmittance diffuser. This design creates a fantastic spread of light across the entire span of a light panel, with no visible LEDs, hotspots, or shadows. Anidolic lighting systems also use a light guide to capture the rays produced by hidden LEDs and direct them downward, while also scattering light to avoid glare. Some flush mount lights have an uplight LED module which projects light toward a domed reflective chamber for a pool of diffused light.Decorative light fixtures
These lights play with light and art to create sparkle or add sculptural effect to a dining room, living room or bedroom. Ceiling lights with dazzling crystal embellishments impart undeniable glamour and elegance in any classic and luxurious living spaces. Designer light fixtures in various geometric expressions make an imposing fashion statement that instantly transforms any bland room into a captivating space. Pioneering use of shade materials and sculptural forms lend a beautiful accent to complement and refresh any decor in need of something decorative.
Light Quality
The quality of light in a residential space, which is a private retreat for relaxation, escape and self-indulgence, is more important than in other environments. High quality, visually pleasing illumination is essential for both visual recognition and personal enjoyment. For an interior lighting fixture, there are three contributing factors that can cause a negative visual experience: glare (excessive luminance within the field of view), flicker (rapid variation in light source intensity) and poor color rendering (unbalanced spectral power distribution). While the noticeable glare can be mitigated through optical engineering, flicker and poor color rendering are subtle and only discriminating consumers will take them seriously.Flicker
Flicker and other visual anomalies occur when the sinusoidal waveform of the alternating mains voltage falls below the required minimum on-voltage of the LED load within each half-wave of the sinusoidal mains voltage. The interharmonics of a rectified signal affect the quality of the output, which results in output current ripple that match the AC frequency, such as 100 or 120 Hz. Flicker at a frequency of 100/120 Hz is not visible to most people and so most people are unaware of that. However, this high-frequency flicker still has negative effects such as eyestrain, blurred vision and impaired visual task performance. A small percentage of the population is particularly sensitive to this temporal light modulation. The sensitivity to flicker can trigger symptoms such as headaches, migraine and general malaise.Flicker in general is not a concern for LED light fixtures which are operated by high quality AC-DC constant current drivers because these driver circuitry includes a capacitor across the diode bridge to smooth out the peaks. As mentioned above, DOB technology is a popular driving solution for LED ceiling lights because it simplifies the luminaire design. However, the design of LED light engines with AC-direct regulation involves a number of compromises including system efficiency, power factor and light quality (flicker). In particular this design suffers from 120 Hz flicker as the LEDs go dark every mains half-cycle. Many lighting manufacturers use DOB technology primarily for the purpose of reducing components costs and are less likely to use additional components to mitigate flicker. Consequently DOB lights should not be used considered if you really care about light quality.
Spectral quality
Phosphor conversion LEDs, at their most basic, emit only a narrow portion of the visible spectrum. This means light emitted by LEDs without an optimized phosphor composition does not have the right amount of spectral content in every wavelength of the visible spectrum from 400nm to 700nm. These LEDs typically have a CRI Ra of 80, as opposed to the 95 CRI of incandescent lighting. And such LEDs do not have red wavelengths (R9) and, to some extent, cyan. Red and cyan are particularly important for color rendering in our living spaces where we take every color seriously in our decor. Without a good color composition, the world around us becomes lifeless, our skin tones appear unflattering, and the atmosphere would feel less intimate and welcoming.The color performance of LEDs can be improved to a level comparable to that of incandescent lamps, but it will add cost to the product. Most consumers are uneducated and don't realize long gone are the days when we could enjoy the highest quality artificial light with incandescent and halogen lights. Lighting manufacturers are not pressed to improve color quality in their products. They only bother about cost structure and cost competitiveness. As a result most consumer-grade residential lighting products incorporate the cheapest and lowest quality LEDs. SMD LED bulbs, in particular, use LEDs with a typical CRI of 80 and a narrow band spectrum optimized for luminous efficacy, not full spectrum color rendering. We'd rather suggest that you buy an incandescent bulb instead of these rubbishes, which are not only poor in color quality, but also terrible in thermal management and driving circuit design.
