In February I attended the Strategies in Light conference in Santa Clara, Calif., the annual conference celebrating its tenth year where “chipheads” congregate to figure out how to conquer the world with solid-state lighting. After all, things in the Silicon Valley are a little slow these days, and with 10 billion lamps to replace in the U.S. alone, the right light could make someone as rich as Bill Gates.
However, this year the conference organizers took the chance of creating a lighting design conference track and inviting lighting designers to speak, in addition to the conference’s main focus—the high brightness LED Market. Despite the slow economy and modest attendance, a standing room only crowd of over 500 filled the hall for the lighting design track during the session—Designing with LEDs: Challenges and Opportunities—in which I presented my talk titled: “Niche to Mainstream – Practical LED Applications and Transformational Lighting.” Perhaps long overdue, the chiphead crowd seemed very intent to learn how solid-state lighting was perceived in the marketplace particularly as it pertains to architectural lighting applications.
But why invite lighting designers to participate in a conference that is primarily focused on a broad market and advanced technical issues? Well, among our interests is the fascination with new things. We want to try the latest lamp, to achieve a new effect, to reach new heights of technical performance, and most of all, to find new ways to design good lighting. Since the first color-changing chips and large-scale installations, LEDs have encouraged creativity among architectural lighting designers, theatrical lighting designers, architects, interior designers, fixture designers, and landscape architects like almost no other lamp or light source before. It’s the leading edge of a revolution, and who better to discuss the possibilities than lighting designers?
The relevance of the lighting designer has been proven before. Remember the MR16 lamp? A mere 25 years ago, MR16 lamps and luminaires were unusual and expensive. The lamp was an experiment by G.E. using slide projector technology. Lighting designers quickly realized they could create theatrical lighting effects from tiny recessed and track luminaires. That little lamp was used to win numerous lighting design awards and to establish many important lighting design careers. Not only is the MR16 the most successful “designer” lamp of all time, but it also shows the capability of the lighting design community to accelerate the adoption of new technology.
What did the lighting designers actually say? Almost in unison, the four presenters in my panel, which included Kevin Willmorth, Stefan Graf and Derry Berrigan, were guarded. There is no question about the potential of the light-emitting diode, but there is considerable concern about current products. Lumen output, life ratings, efficacy—we all said that almost none of the ratings are to be trusted. The audience also got an earful about poor color, lousy dimming performance, and most of all, the terrible state of testing and rating standards. I tried to set a positive and optimistic tone in my presentation. But the truth is, there is a chasm between current LED products and mainstream lighting that cannot be simply crossed with marketing brochures and private laboratory tests. As a lighting designer, I am guilty of using new products and I pride myself in showing what can be done with them. But while I like the leading edge, I hate the bleeding edge.
We still have a long way to go in the evolution of LEDs. Until this happens, we will see a lot of bad LED lighting based on good intentions. Compared to incandescent filament, LEDs leave a lot to be desired. It's unfortunate that LEDs are not competing against whale oil and gas mantles; their adoption would be immediate and assured. It is the good intention of legislators who are banning incandescents that will cause the most bad lighting. Lighting designers will be responsible for very little of the really bad results.