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Mark Hudzinski

LED lights suck.

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At least, mine did, and I’m willing to bet yours do also. It’s not your fault, and it’s not the fault of the person who built your home, or the electrician that installed the lights, either. It’s simply time for a better lighting solution.

First, a quick lesson in lighting and its impact on humans. For most of our history, we relied on two primary sources of light: the sun and fire. Once we began living in structures, fire was our main indoor light source. About 150 years ago, the incandescent light bulb was invented, which was highly effective at rendering accurate colors and, when dimmed, shifted to a warmer color temperature, much like firelight. Over the last 15 years, however, we’ve transitioned mostly to LED lighting due to the inefficiency and high energy use of incandescent bulbs. While this shift has improved energy efficiency, it has come at a cost—both to our personal health and to the aesthetic quality of our indoor spaces.

Can light GlareGlare from standard LED “cans” is very uncomfortable in a room

Getting the colors right

In the lighting world, “color rendering” describes how accurately a light source reveals the colors of everything it touches.  The industry standard for measuring this is called “Color Rendering Index”, or CRI for short, and uses a scale of 0-100.

A high CRI light brings colors to life, making everything appear vibrant and natural. Incandescent and halogen bulbs, once the standard in art galleries and luxury retail stores, had a CRI of 100. In contrast, the fluorescent tubes often found in warehouses or garages typically had a CRI around 50, which is why those spaces can feel sterile and drab. LED bulbs and fixtures come in a wide range of CRI performance. However, many LED bulbs with high on-paper CRI values fail to render the full color spectrum accurately, often appearing “off” to our eyes. We want the artwork, furnishings, and materials we’ve chosen for our homes to look their best, but poor CRI lighting can hinder that. Additionally, recent studies show that low CRI lighting can lead to physical discomfort, including eye strain and fatigue.

CRI exampleAn example of poor CRI lighting on the left, and high CRI lighting to the right

Why dimming matters

One key principle of good lighting design is to “put everything on a dimmer.”  Most of the time, interior lights don’t need to be at full brightness – perhaps only in the middle of the day, or in an emergency situation.  

Incandescent lighting from the past had two comforting benefits when dimmed.  First, they dimmed smoothly all the way from max brightness, to off.  Second, as they dimmed, the light they output got warmer in color temperature.  An incandescent bulb has a color temperature of about 3000k (“warm white”) at full brightness, and about 1800k (which is similar to candlelight) at its lower dimmed range.  As humans, we respond to higher color temperature light with feelings of energy and alertness, and lower color temperature lighting promotes relaxation and calm.

Conversely, most LED bulbs struggle to dim smoothly and will flicker or blink, and oftentimes shut off completely at a brightness level well above where we would like them to be, such as 25-30%, making it hard to achieve the low, relaxing light we’re after.  Also, most LED lights do not change color temperature as they dim, which leads to a color of light that’s often described as “gray”.

Warm Dimming

Evolved Home brings beautiful lighting to your home

So, what’s the solution?  Ceiling-recessed cans with poor-performing LED bulbs are common in many homes, but there are effective ways to improve both their performance and appearance. Until recently, the most available options were to replace all the recessed lights with expensive LED fixtures, then patch and repaint the ceiling—a costly, time-consuming process. Now, Evolved Home offers a simpler, more affordable way to upgrade your lighting without the hassle. Our retrofit solution fits into almost any standard 6” “can-light” fixture, requiring no repairs or major renovations. Available in black or white trims, these lamps offer a variety of premium features:

  • Exceptional color rendering: 90+ CRI across the spectrum for lifelike color in all shades

  • Smooth dimming: as low as 2%, depending on the dimmer

  • Dynamic color temperature: 3000k at full brightness, 1800k at lowest levels, with a smooth, natural transition

  • Adjustable beam angle: 30-50 degree beam width adjustment and up to 50 degree aiming gimbal adjustment allow for high-end architectural detail or artwork highlighting, and the ability to get the right light right where it should be

Evolved Home LED Fixture

An Easy, Affordable Upgrade

Including installation and a dimmer control, the cost is approximately $150 per fixture. For a typical kitchen, you can expect to spend under $2,000 total—an affordable investment for a significant lighting upgrade. If you’re ready to enhance the atmosphere of your home, Evolved Home is here to help. We offer complimentary in-home assessments and personalized proposals for as many rooms as you’d like to upgrade. In many cases, we can even arrange an in-home demonstration so you can see the difference firsthand. Reach out to us today to schedule a consultation and get started.

Take the next step toward a more beautifully lit home

How To Get The Most Out Of Your Audio/Video System

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Perhaps you’ve recently upgraded to a new Ultra HD-capable television or immersive surround audio system, or are thinking about doing so in the near future. The best gear in the world is always going to be limited by the quality of the media sources that you play through it. In this short article, we hope to provide you with the tools to help get the most out of your investment in high-performance audio and video equipment.


Streaming Services
With streaming music and video services being the preferred method of content acquisition for the vast majority of our clients, we thought it important to detail an issue that most people don’t seem to be aware of, but is critical to getting the best experience out of your private cinema, media room, or music systems. Most people are now subscribers to at least a few different media streaming platforms. Netflix, Disney+, Prime Video, Hulu, HBO Max, and Apple TV (the channel, not the device) are the major players in video. Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and Pandora are the most common music platforms we see people using. What many people don’t understand is that almost all of these services offer multiple tiers, some free and most paid- for their services which offer not only omission of advertisements or additional features, but in many cases can have dramatic impacts on the picture and sound quality they provide.
For example, as of this writing, Netflix offers four different plan options:


For the purposes of this blog, we’re only concerned with the audio/video differences between the different plans, which are pretty dramatic. The “Basic” plans only support 720p resolution video, which falls somewhere between DVD and Blu-Ray quality for picture; the “Standard” tier bumps up to 1080p video, which is close to the quality of a Blu-ray Disc picture; only once you get to the “Premium” tier do you actually get full “4K” video quality with HDR color on certain content.
Most all current model TV’s beyond the most basic models support 4K and HDR color, and it makes a dramatic improvement in picture quality compared to the lower resolution options. However, if you’re not paying for those higher-level tiers with the video services you subscribe to, you’re not going to get any better picture than what you could have gotten from a system 10 years ago.
If we look at the music-focused services: Apple Music currently has 4 different plans, Spotify has 2 plans, and Amazon Music has 3. In all cases, you need to subscribe to the upper-tier plans to be able to play your music in sound quality that even matches what we were used to with CD’s. Most services now offer an HD-audio tier that provides a sound quality that is higher than what was offered via CD…if you’re listening through the earbuds that came with your phone or a portable bluetooth speaker it probably won’t benefit you at all. But if you’ve invested in some better quality audio gear at home, or higher-end headphones, the benefit is worth the extra couple bucks.


Cable and Satellite Service
Most of our clients still utilize cable or satellite TV service in some degree. Both of those delivery methods are having some growing pains with delivering content in full UltraHD quality, and for most people it is worth checking to verify that your cable or satellite receivers can support the better quality signals. Odds are good that if you haven’t changed out the cable or satellite boxes in the last 4 years, you probably don’t have a box that supports the best quality possible.


The best movie experience: Kaleidescape
If you truly love movies, nothing beats Kaleidescape for quality. Kaleidescape is the only download-based product that provides true reference-quality picture and lossless audio. The audio and video have bitrates that are 10x higher than most streaming services, providing truly identical quality to the studio masters of the movies. Kaleidescape actually downloads the entire movie to it’s own storage before starting playback, so there is never any chance of “buffering” or downgraded quality due to internet speed fluctuations.


Physical Media
Discs still provide a great experience, and they also still work if your internet service is out. UltraHD Blu-Ray provides the finest quality picture and sound available (equal to Kaleidescape and better than any streaming service). For many people, the ritual and warmth of vinyl is a great way to enjoy music, and modern turntables have never been easier to get a great experience out of.