In developing Lumen Designer, Lighting Technologies partnered with LightWork Design, the number one rendering engine developer in the world, to utilize state-of-the-art rendering technologies coupled with light accurate calculations. The goal is to produce accurate lighting calculations, incorporating real world materials and physically accurate models, as efficiently as possible - i.e. "make it fast".
The guide below shows how different calculation settings are used in Lumen Designer to improve the accuracy for both lighting values and photo-realistic renderings. As noted below, if you just need "the numbers" and no rendering, you can often achieve accurate results with minimum settings.
Finally, Lighting Technologies' is always checking calculations for accuracy and is committed to keeping its reputation for accurate lighting calculations.
| Break Room Project
This moderately complex project was chosen to highlight how different calculation settings will change analysis time and rendering quality.
This model includes approximately 150 surfaces with 2'x2' prismatic troffers and 4 downlights.
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Default Settings - 7 seconds
Lumen Designer's Calculation Manager gives you access to several analysis settings. Expert users can utilize these settings to streamline calculations for even the most complex projects.
For new users, Designer includes several pre-defined templates you can choose to quickly modify several settings.
Move your mouse cursor over the image to view the calculation mesh - these are the patches used in the radiosity calculation. The smaller the patch, the more accurate the calculation. |
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Standard Template - 12 seconds
Switching to the Standard settings template, we've improved the ceiling and wall around the cabinets is improved.
If you were interested in just the horizontal illuminance at the workplane or floor, either of these templates would give you sufficiently accurate results. |
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Detailed Template - 45 seconds
As you can see by rolling your cursor over the image, the patches / meshing used for the calculations is getting much more detailed.
You can see the effects mostly on the wall around the cabinets and the columns along the wall.
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Hybrid Rendering
Rather than continue to adjust Designer's radiosity settings, we can take the results from above and produce a Hybrid rendering.
A Hybrid takes the interreflected component from the radiosity calculation and adds a highly accurate direct calculation pixel-by-pixel on your screen.
This brings out much better detail on the upper cabinets and the texture in fabric blinds.
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Note: All calculations times are based on a Athlon 64 3800+ with 1 GB of RAM.
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