5 Film and Home Pros Reveal the Biggest Lighting Mistakes You're Making

You can have a beautiful house full of lovely furniture and on-trend design choices. But if your home’s lighting isn’t very good, the vibe probably won’t be either — in real life or in the listing photos. Potential homebuyers likely don’t love imagining spending their time in a home that’s too dark, or a home that’s lit so harshly that it nearly gives you a headache.

There are plenty of ways to improve your home’s ambiance using light, but if your home isn’t drenched in natural light, the process of zhuzhing up your lighting for an open house or a Zillow listing can feel overwhelming — especially with so many types of lamps, bulbs, and fixtures out there.

So I decided to get some advice from pros — specifically, people who work in lighting for film and TV (plus real estate agents and home designers). And don’t worry — you won’t need to invest in any fancy studio lighting in order to make your home “shine.”

The First Thing to Tweak About Your Home’s Lighting

One relatively simple way to make a big difference in your living space is to do something about your overhead lighting. As Dru Rockitt, a film electrician, puts it, “Single overhead lights have no character or soul.”

Jarrett Mann Martin, a Realtor with Corcoran Classic Living in Athens, Georgia, agrees: “There is something harsh and off-putting when the only light source is an overhead light.”

That doesn’t mean you need to pull out all your overhead lighting and invest only in lamps. In fact, quite the opposite is true.

“[Overhead lighting is] necessary, but there are plenty of ways to soften it and make it less terrible,” notes Sean Dolnick, who works in the electrical department across film and television productions in New York City. The key is making your lighting options beyond your overhead light varied and supplemental.

One Bright Idea? Dimmers

If browsing for extra lamps gives you decision fatigue, or you don’t have much room (or budget!) for additional lighting, you can still make useful tweaks to what’s already in your home, including that pesky overhead light.

“We typically recommend all ceiling [or] wall lights be put on dimmers,” says Emily Ward of the Texas-based Heather Scott Home & Design. “Just be sure to use the correct light bulbs because if they aren’t compatible with dimmers, they will flicker.”

“The overhead lighting in my home is recessed lighting on a dimmer switch,” adds Martin. “The only way an overhead light is on at full brightness is if I’ve dropped something important and am on the hunt for it.”

“If you have [overhead lighting] on a dimmer, you can lower it so it provides enough ambient light to see, then have ‘hotspots’ that highlight things you wanna show off, like a bookshelf, a kitchen table, or a record stand,” Dolnick adds.

The More Light Options, the Merrier

The “hotspots” Dolnick mentions include options like floor lamps, table lamps, and sconces. There’s a lot of opportunity for creativity here, including how you cover your lightbulbs in order to make the lighting less harsh.

“I remember using a light bulb in a soup can on many occasions. Nothing is too sacred or taboo to become a light,” Davenport quips.

Dolnick, too, has “a bunch of funky stuff” that adds not just personality to his space, but also different sources of light. From “a light-up world globe with a bulb in the center, to a steel chain that hangs from the ceiling [with] three orbs and each orb has a bulb, [to a] weird grow light pendant thing,” Dolnick’s home is cast with personality-filled warmth.

Bare Bulbs Should Be Avoided at All Costs

Dolnick’s one rule? “I never want to be looking at a bare bulb,” he says.

“I try and not make things too what we [in film] call ‘sourcey,’ meaning I don’t want to see the bulb. I [also] want to make all my lighting and cables as hidden as possible, unless it’s a cool lamp and I want to show it off,” notes Dolnick. “Everything looks better if a cable is run with 90-degree lines. I’ll first go to the wall, then turn right, then go down the windowsill. Hiding things along edges will always make a cable not stick out as much.”

Ward, for her part, suggests covering up those bulbs with “custom lampshades with different fabrics or trims,” which can be a fun way to match your lighting with the rest of your home’s aesthetic, and giving your space a more designer-like feel — a big draw for potential buyers.

Light “Color” Matters More than You Think

The color of the lightbulbs you use in your lamps plays a big role here, and I’m not just talking about those color-changing LEDs. White light comes in all shades as well, and not every type is necessarily well-suited to the home.

“Typically, when the builder provides the light bulbs for light fixtures, they will choose LED bulbs that are stark white. This can make a space feel like a hospital or grocery store,” Ward says.

Essentially everyone I spoke with recommended switching these out for warmer bulbs.

There are multiple reasons for this suggestion: “I feel I look better in the mirror under warm lighting, as opposed to the bluish [or] bright white tones,” Martin says. “Under the latter, I can see every flaw in my skin, and it drives me crazy!” Rockitt adds that “you want warm colors — warm white — wherever you eat food. Cool white adds blues to your food and can almost always make your food seem less appetizing.”

Some terms to keep in mind when bulb-shopping are kelvins and CRI. Kelvins indicate the color temperature of a light — warmer, cozier bulbs are closer to the 2,000k range, while actual daylight is around 6500k. The CRI, or the Color Rendering Index, is how accurate colors look under that particular light. The higher the CRI, the better everything generally looks.

“Even when I’m looking for house bulbs, I’m looking for a high CRI bulb because it renders skin tones prettier,” notes Dolnick. “Everyone wants to look their best in their own home.” Including the people touring it!

Further Reading

We Tested (and Rated!) All the Sofas at Ashley — Here Are the Best to Suit Your Style and Space

See How a Stager Used Paint to Transform a 1950s Living Room

We Asked 8 Pro Travelers What They Never Pack in Their Carry-On, and Here’s What They Said