[tialarre]

We enclosed our lanai and used Solar Guys to install ceramic window film. At that time, as I recall, the sold 3 - dark, darker, darkest. We went with the middle (darker). This cuts the afternoon sun, but still allows in a lot of light. It darkens the room somewhat, but what is really nice is the privacy from outside. Looking in from outside during the day, unless their is some other bright light inside, there is 90-95% privacy. We can sit at our pub table and watch the sunset or the neighbors walking by and have still have privacy.
The downside was at night. Once it gets dark and the lights go on inside it's like being in a fishbowl. Anyone outside can see everything going on inside. So, we also added pull-down shades from Home Depot. HD sells varying thickness (thick, thicker, thickest). We initially order thicker (mid thick), but you could still see through the shades at night with the lights on. So we returned the thicker and replaced with thickest. That did the trick. We now have complete privacy at night with the pull-down shades and complete privacy during the day with the shades up and the solar film on the window.
Our lanai faces west, so we get the afternoon sun. During the summer, we sometimes have to pull the shades down during the afternoon, as even with the solar film, the lanai still gets hot.
We had T&D enlarge and enclose our lanai. We did not want slider doors to enclose the lanai, we wanted windows. We have seven large windows that open side-to-side, with screens, so when it cools down, we can open the windows and front door and get a nice breeze through the house. Also, we did not want a knee wall at the bottom. We felt it made the lanai look smaller, so the bottom panel below each window is a glass panel.