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Design Low Voltage Lighting for your Backyard

When considering the design for low voltage lighting in your backyard, it's good to know the basic lighting techniques.

Up Lighting: Is the most common technique used for accenting focal points and it creating shadows on walls.

Path Lighting: It's best to use Path lights for walk ways, gardens and seasonal plants. Place the fixtures back away from drives and walks so that they are close enough to supply adequate light but not to close to be a hazard.

Cross Lighting: This technique brings an even light to the object which allows optimum viewing for many angles.

Down Lighting: By placing the lighting fixtures in trees and on structures you can simulate natural down lighting such as the Sun, Moon and Stars.

Back lighting: Is usually a softer form of landscape lighting that creates depth and visual interest.

Silhouette Lighting:Is a form of back lighting, but the light is placed directly behind the object with the wall or fence illuminated to create a silhouette of the object.

Shadowing: There are two types of shadowing. Positive shadows create visual interest and a little bit of mystery. Negative in that the shadow will hide a obstacle from view.

Wall Washing: This technique is used in accenting architecture and grazing of surfaces to create more visual interest and could provide area lighting through reflection.

Grazing: Here the light source is placed very close to a wall and is aimed directly up to just graze the surface so that textures, shapes and forms are highlighted to draw visual interest.