What they do
Each calculator answers one question a lighting designer asks, and draws the thing it is talking about: the room with its fittings and their beams, a tuning path as a strip of colour, a dimming curve as a strip of light. They start with the basics of illuminance, beams, tape and running cost, and go on to colour, control, human-centric lighting and light-emitting surfaces. They are built in that order.
The calculators
- Scene illuminance. How bright will this scene be, in this room, with these fittings?
- Beam spread. How big is the pool of light from this fitting at this height?
- LED tape power and voltage drop. What driver do I need, and will the far end dim?
- Running cost. What will this scheme cost to run each year?
- Colour point. What colour temperature is this, is it green, and do two fittings match?
- Tuning path. What happens between the two colour temperatures on the datasheet?
- Pitch and viewing distance. What pitch does this display need for where people will be?
- Control resolution and the dimming curve. Will this dim smoothly at the level I use?
- Reachable colour. Can this engine make the client's colour, and how bright?
- Melanopic light. What does this light do to the day, in numbers?
- Display light in the room. How much light does this display add to the room?
- Art exposure. How much light will this artwork receive in a year?
Free to use and tied to no brand. They go with the Lighting Expert course, as the Cinema Tools calculators go with Cinema Expert.
Alongside them
- Lighting Expert training in lighting design, in preparation
- Cinema Tools free calculators for cinema design
- Cinema Expert the cinema design course