The Cosmetic Dentistry Blog

Dear Dr. Hall,
I have a perplexing situation, and while it sounds very familiar to many of the other questions you have received, it has an interesting twist. I recently just received 10 porcelain veneers on my upper teeth and while I love the shape, size, the color is still not as vivid as my original teeth.

The cosmetic dentist is very good and has received much recognition so I’m not worried about his skills. He said I received the whitest shade possible for translucent veneers. And while they are very white, I don’t feel like they are as bright or white as my original teeth.

My dentist is offering to redo them, with the help of the lab tech. They both say that in order to achieve a whiter and brighter look, they will have to use an opaque veneer, which often looks like Chiclets…a look I was trying to avoid. He says that many celebrities opt for this veneer because it is much whiter, so that leaves me to think that maybe they are not as “fake looking” as they lead on to be. My question is, is there any way to have whiter veneers to achieve the desired whiteness without having them look silly? Or is there a way to make them semi-translucent? Thanks for you time.

Sincerely,
Erin in Texas

Erin,
I hope you really have an expert cosmetic dentist/artist because that makes all the difference. It sounds like it, because of the response you say you’re getting from him. Though he does sound a little too timid about giving you white, white veneers, so I’m a little skeptical about his artistic passion.

Yes, many celebrities get the bright white teeth because they want to look dazzling, but when you look at them up close the teeth do have a fake look to them. But they don’t look silly, I wouldn’t say. I often did porcelain veneers like this. We called them “ballistic white” and some people loved them and others wanted a more natural look. You do have the trade off with opacity. I never had people get ballistic white porcelain veneers and then later indicate that they wished they had gone more natural. I did sometimes have people who chose a more natural look and later wished they had gotten whiter teeth.

If you want your smile to shine from across the room so that you look dazzling and attract attention, then I’d go with the ballistic white. If you want your teeth to look sparkling but more natural, so that you have a pretty smile but a more normal-looking smile, then I’d tone it down a little and go for more translucent. This is the great thing with cosmetic dentistry when it is done by a real artist–you have this latitude to project the kind of personality and image you want.

There are things that your cosmetic dentist and his laboratory technician can do with surface texture and gloss that can make your teeth sparkle more without going with the white, white look, so that’s an option you can consider.

And you should be able to get the veneers somewhat whiter than your original teeth and still have them look translucent and natural. It’s when you get them a lot whiter than your own teeth that you have to use more opaquer.
- Dr. Hall

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Dr. Hall,
I am in the process of getting a single veneer on my very front tooth and I’m starting to think that this was a mistake. My new veneer was ready today. When I went in to get it put in, I was mortified. It looked so fake next to my other front tooth. I am now very worried…

I had heard that when you’re going to get a veneer in one front tooth, you should get it on both, but after a consultation with my dentist, he seemed confident we could get it done to my satisfaction.

My teeth are very healthy. The only reason I wanted a veneer was because one of my front teeth was discolored due to a childhood accident which caused the nerve to calcify. It got worse over the years and bleaching does nothing since it’s internal.

He was understanding that I didn’t like the veneer and he even brought in the lab tech to come in and see me on a moment’s notice. They’re trying their best. They’re making a new veneer, but I’m almost thinking that I should just call them and tell them to do BOTH of my front teeth. Is this the best way to go? I can’t imagine getting this veneer to look good and then having to get it replaced in 15 years.

Please help. I’m starting to regret that I even started this.
- Susie in Iowa

Susie,
You can get a single porcelain veneer and get it to match, but you need an expert cosmetic dentist.

The trouble your dentist is having combined with the information you gave that he is calling in the lab technician to help with this–both of these lead me to believe that your dentist isn’t really good with color manipulation, which is the case with maybe most dentists.

But then your case is extra difficult, because the underlying tooth is probably quite dark. This means that even if your dentist did two porcelain veneers, they would still be quite difficult to match.

When you have this kind of cosmetic dentistry done, you need a dentist who is an artist, which is a small minority of dentists.

I really think you need to find an expert cosmetic dentist. It is so easy for dentists to just say they can do cosmetic dentistry, that very very few take the trouble to pursue the extra training they need to be good at it. There aren’t many dentists in Iowa who could do this well for you.

I would not have this dentist do the two porcelain veneers. Once they start the second one, you won’t be able to go back–you’ll forever have to have two. I would find an expert cosmetic dentist on our list of Iowa cosmetic dentists. You’ve got a difficult case, and from what you said, it appears to me that your dentist is so far off, I don’t think he’s going to make this work for you.

When I a single veneer on a dark tooth, I did a direct composite veneer with dental bonding techniques, because I could see the results immediately and could adjust the color as I went by using less or more opaquer and varying the tints and the translucency as I went. But this required a trained eye for color that most dentists don’t have.

Dr. Hall

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