February 1, 2024
Practitioners of esthetic dentistry are to smile design as Starbucks baristas are to the perfect latte. Point being, you want the most skilled individuals performing this most important of jobs, and the dynamics behind your smile (in addition to your morning coffee) should be left to the professionals! Imagine flashing your pearly whites while the dental team is giving jumping high fives to each other and the Rocky Theme Song resounds through the office!
While a perfect smile is an excellent way to display a job well done, it is also very beneficial to take note of what happens when violations of smile design principles occur and how dentists can restore any violations back to an ideal form. This will leave you waltzing out of your final appointment with the dental team yelling, “Go book your headshots, Hollywood!”
In all seriousness… here are 7 common problems the docs at Atlanta Dental Spa see in consultations:
Understanding a patient’s natural head position is key when dentists assess facial balance. Just like makeup artists and hairstylists, dentists use this skill to achieve harmony. In fact, part of what is general dentistry treatment involves performing a full facial esthetic analysis, looking at the entire face instead of focusing only on the mouth. A vertical line drawn from the nose tip to the chin helps guide smile design, creating a straighter, more balanced look. That means better precision for the dentist—and long-lasting confidence for the patient.
The flashiest smiles show perfect symmetry between the teeth and the curve of the lips. A reverse smile, where the curve turns concave, can make the smile appear unhappy. To keep your grin looking bright and confident, your dentist will examine tooth length and lip shape, deciding if canines need to be shortened or incisors lengthened. Many patients choose Brookhaven cosmetic veneers as part of this process, since they can refine tooth shape and balance your smile. With digital tools like photography, video, and mock-ups, you’ll see exactly how your new smile will shine.
The violation of the Social Six refers to altering only the top six front teeth in terms of colour and shape. Correcting these teeth without balancing the back teeth often leaves a narrow, artificial look. Your dental team should take pretreatment photos and evaluate both front and side smile views to ensure a natural result. Over-brightening the back teeth, on the other hand, can create a denture-like effect. Finding balance is essential in cosmetic work, and knowing what is general dentistry can help patients understand how overall treatment planning supports a natural, confident smile.
The Golden Proportion was once the go-to formula for designing the “perfect” smile, but today’s cosmetic dentists focus more on personal proportions and natural balance. Much like moving from a Gameboy to a PlayStation 4, dentistry has evolved. Patients now ask practical questions too—like how long does dentist numbing last—showing the shift toward treatments that fit real-life needs as well as aesthetics.
With that said, if the less regimented designs are not done correctly, an offset of ratios will create an artificial appearance. And thus, using computer programs to draw lines and proportions on images of a patient’s teeth helps dentists visualize the process for the patient, and also communicate correct proportions with the laboratory during preplanning. If space in the mouth is limited, your dentist can narrow or slightly rotate the lateral teeth to create room for the central teeth. Having the mindset that no one mouth is the same as the next can help ensure better smiles for generations to come. Just think, your future grandchildren’s children’s grandchildren will have the most radiant, and proportional mouths.
Teeth can appear over-contoured when there’s no distinction in how light reflects across different zones of the tooth. Because ceramists work within the limits of preparation designs, they sometimes blur reflective and deflective areas, resulting in bulky-looking teeth. The way lines and angles are shaped also impacts appearance—teeth may look short and wide, long and narrow, or more rectangular and curved. Adjusting angles outward creates a broader look, while moving them inward creates a slimmer effect. Fortunately, this can be corrected with a well-designed mock-up and proper porcelain thickness. When done correctly, veneers restore a natural, balanced smile—similar to how patients ask how long do dental implants last when weighing their cosmetic options, the key lies in technique and precision for lasting results.
Just like in all areas of life, it’s important to establish boundaries in the space around a tooth. When designing a smile, it is crucial to provide adequate room for angles between teeth. Worn tooth edges in a smile result in reduced or non-existent angles. This unfortunately leads to a flat smile line and aged appearance – no one wants that! Therefore, clinicians must recreate the natural angle progression to restore appropriate tooth lengths and curves. All of this can be done provided there is room to recreate negative space, and properly address the angles in the design stages. Magicians can stick to their smoke and mirrors, because dentists have this covered!
The final smile design issue is asymmetrical gum margins. Instead of chasing perfect symmetry, the goal is harmony—creating balance across tooth groups rather than exact mirror images. Patients often ask big-picture questions like do dental implants last forever, and the same principle applies here: long-term aesthetics rely more on overall harmony than rigid perfection.
Gum margin positioning is significant in people with medium-to-high smile lines. The smile line is the location of the lip when a person smiles. Pre-treatment images are absolutely necessary when it comes to effectively evaluating gum margins. This helps everyone visualize the aesthetics to come and further ensure that the results will reflect the expectations. In short, stay harmonious when it comes to smile design, as creating exact symmetry can disrupt the balance and beauty of a smile. Who knew smile design could be so Zen? Namaste, my friends.
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