Different Ways to Access Your Lighting Control System

Lighting control is one of the best features of home automation because it’s convenient, helps you save energy, and makes your Covington, Louisiana home look beautiful. While there are a lot of practical benefits, such as saving money on your utility bills, there’s also the benefit of being able to control your lights different ways. You get to decide how you want to brighten or dim your house. Continue reading to learn more.

SEE ALSO: How to Incorporate Lighting into Your Interior DesignDimmers: Dimmers allow you to raise or lower the lighting to varying degrees, instead of simply turning the lights completely on or off. Years ago, dimmers typically were round knobs on the wall that you would turn to the right or left. However, today we have more sophisticated controls to change lighting levels. Lutron for example, has a new LED lighting strip, called the Grafik T, which brightens as you raise the lights to a high level and darkens as they go down low. The lighting strip comes on with just the touch of your finger. We also have up and down buttons that you press to change the setting.

Keypads: Another way to control your lights is through custom keypads on the wall. These keypads can be tailored to any home automation scene you like. For example, you could list, “All on,” “All off,” “Movie,” Good Morning” and “Goodnight” on the keypad in your kitchen. And, every keypad could be different in every room of your home for different functions. Imagine walking out the door in the morning for work and simply pressing “All off”.  The best part about the keypads is that you never have to guess which switch does what; they are all labeled.

Mobile App: Having control keypads in your home is a must have for quick and easy access while you’re hanging around the house, but mobile apps take your control system a step further and let you access your lighting from any location in the world. With a strong network and a smart home app on your phone, you turn off any light in the house. Download the mobile app on your smartphone, tablet, or even your smart watch to manage the features of your home.

Occupancy Sensors: These sensors allow you to turn on your lights just by walking into an area. Sensors are installed at key points on the walls so as soon as you go into a room, the lights come on. When you leave, they go off. This technology particularly helps you save energy because you don’t have to worry about remembering to turn the light off when to leave the room. Your smart home does it for you.

QMotion Fabric Selections for Your New Orleans Property

Often families become pre-occupied with the way their curtains look, including the pattern, color, and style. However, there are other aspects to consider, including the openness factor, UV-ray prevention, and material quality. These properties will help your family save energy and still allow you to enjoy the beauty of your shades. Read this fabric selection guide to get a better understanding of all the items to consider when you purchase motorized shades for your New Orleans, LA home.

SEE ALSO: 3 Reasons Motorized Shades are Worth Your Investment Fabric Types Solar shades are commonly used to block out the sun’s UV rays to protect furniture and keep the home cool. They can reduce your cooling costs during the year by keeping out the heat and also lessen your need for artificial lighting. QMotion has a new fabric type called KOOLBLACK, which is a dark fabric that reflects the sun’s rays instead of absorbing them. By reflecting the light, the KOOLBLACK shades reduce heat gain and save energy. They also give you more visibility so you can see outside. KOOLBLACK shades are ideal for work environments and for the home too.

Fabric Color Light fabrics are ideal for common areas, like living rooms and kitchens. They reflect a high percentage of light to keep out heat, while still preserving natural light to reduce the need for artificial light. Dark color fabrics don’t let as much light in through the window but increase the exterior visibility during daylight hours. So if you want to see outside, pick a darker color fabric. Dark fabric colors are ideal for media rooms or home theaters to reduce glare on the screen as well. They can also be used in bedrooms to ensure privacy.

Openness Factor The openness factor refers to the tightness of the weave of your shade fabric, which determines how much you can see through it. A blackout shade, for example, would have an openness factor of 0% because you can’t see anything through it. Sheer fabrics, on the other hand, let you see outside, but the tradeoff is that they let more light and heat inside your home. If you choose a shade with an openness factor of 1%, 99% of the UV light is blocked. Though it will be harder to see out of them you will conserve more energy. If you pick a sheer fabric, keep in mind that people may be able to see inside your home at night. So when you get started choosing your motorized shade fabric, make sure you take the openness factor into account.

Dual Shades Yes, there are many different types of shade fabrics, but you don’t necessarily have to choose just one for every room. Double roller applications let you have the benefits of both shade types – sheer and blackout. Hit your remote control or button on your mobile app and the blackout shade will drop down for a movie. Then, later on, change it and lower the sheer shade so you can read a book in a bright, sunlit room but still stay cool.

Discover all Your Options for AV Content in New Orleans

If you look at how audio and video technology has evolved over the previous 50 years, or even the past five years, you’ll see a dramatic difference. We’ve gone from audio cassette tapes and VHS tapes to CDs and DVDs, and from grainy sound and picture to vivid colors and crystal clear images. Along with those changes in devices is the way we attain and enjoy content. You don’t necessarily have to purchase and own a CD or DVD anymore. You can subscribe to streaming services and get unlimited amounts of movies and music. In this blog, we are going to cover what video and audio streaming is and what the best ways are to access online content using your whole house audio/video system in New Orleans, Louisiana.

SEE ALSO: How to Enjoy the Ultimate Entertainment Experience in Your Louisiana Home
What is video and music streaming?
Video streaming is the process of sending compressed video content over the Internet and displaying it for the viewer in real time. Instead of downloading the video file, or playing a disc, the content can be accessed directly and instantly via the Web. The media is sent in a continuous stream of data and played as it arrives to the screen. Music streaming works in a similar way as music files are compressed and sent via a network connection to your music system, and then through your speakers.

What do I need to stream?
There are a number of ways to use streaming platforms. One way is purchasing a smart TV, which already comes with the most popular services – such as Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon Prime. You can also use a streaming stick, box, or Blu-ray player. Streaming sticks are Wi-Fi enabled, but if the Internet isn’t strong you could experience problems. A wired Ethernet connection, or professional home network like the ones we install, will provide a reliable connection for high-definition movies and games. Smart TVs also have the advantage over sticks and boxes in some respects because they have exclusive content deals with studios to offer more content. In addition, a smart TV has a strong processor to handle Internet content, which helps make navigating and browsing faster.

For music, the top streaming services are Pandora, Spotify, Tidal, and XM Sirius Radio. Some of them are free, like Pandora, and some require a monthly fee for subscription like XM Sirius Radio and Tidal. Like we explained with smart TVs, some wireless speakers or receivers support these streaming services, like Sonos. However, if you already have in-ceiling speakers, or other speakers in your home we can connect the right equipment to give you access to more streaming services so you can listen to unlimited amounts of songs throughout your home. Switching between your personal music collection of CDs or even vinyl and these streaming services will be quick and easy using your smart home interface.

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Learn About the Security Trend that is Changing the Smart Home World

In the world of smart home automation, there are a few ways to simply control your Louisiana home. You can press one button on your mobile device or wall keypad to start a specific scene, or schedule a scene according to date and time. However, now we have another way to control our smart homes – geofencing. Geofencing technology is a relatively new feature to homeowners and gives you another way to manage your home remotely. Instead of using times or dates to start and stop tasks, you can use your precise location. Continue reading this blog on this security and surveillance trend to learn all about it.

SEE ALSO: How to Protect Your New Orleans Home with Security & Surveillance Systems
What is Geo-Fencing?
Geofencing allows you to create an invisible fence around your Covington property so that as soon as someone steps inside or outside of that virtual zone, the security system reacts. Your system uses cell phone tower triangulation to gauge where you are. Once you pass the invisible barrier, either going in or out, certain rules will go into effect. These actions are triggered by a device, most often a smartphone, whenever it crosses into the established zone.

How do I use it with my smart home?
Geofencing can be used for a lot of different reasons other than just security. For example, you can monitor the activity of your children or pets so that when they go outside of a certain area, you get a text message on your phone. This is helpful for determining when your kids get home from school to make sure the home is locked and armed when they are there, or monitoring the behavior of Fido in case he escapes the backyard. Geofencing can be tied to every smart feature in your home, such as motorized shades, automated lighting, surveillance cameras, the smart thermostat, and smart locks. Imagine making your way home from work and your home activating a “welcome home” scene as soon as you are a mile away. The thermostat will adjust to make your house cooler, the lights will turn on, your TV will turn the channel to the afternoon news, and the security system will disarm.

Full Security and Surveillance Solutions
While geofencing is certainly the newest trend in smart security, there are many other ways to protect your home. Here are a few more ways we can install a surveillance and security system in your home to protect your loved ones and valuables.

Part 2 of Reasons Why Shade Control is Worth the Investment

In our last blog on the benefits of motorized shades, we covered saving energy, saving time, and adding security. But there are actually even more benefits to automating your shades or drapes and we wanted to share them with you today. In this article, we’ll cover preventing damage on your home furnishings, increasing the value of your home, and adding beauty. Keep reading to learn more! And don’t forget to check out our previous blog:

SEE ALSO: 3 Reasons Motorized Shades are Worth the Investment

Prevent Damage on Home Furnishings

Did you get sunburned this summer? We certainly hope you didn’t, but it does illustrate the potential damage of the sun’s strong rays. Not only can the sun burn and damage your delicate skin, but in a similar way it damages your furniture and home décor, such as paintings, leather sofas, carpet, and more. Once exposed to UV light, things like chairs, rugs, and sofas lose their vibrant colors and fade. Unfortunately, sun damage is usually irreversible. That’s why it’s important to control the sunlight in your home with shades, and automating them will make it even easier to prevent this damage.