Technology & Software in Today’s Lighting Environment

Spectrum Lighting remains committed to utilizing the most advanced tools available to us. From lighting design and control to economic analysis, we offer a number of solutions for our clients.

Building Information Modeling

The widely growing use of Revit, VectorWorks Architect, Sketchup, MicroStation, and other modeling software has prompted many of our factories to develop the fixture models to be used within these software packages. Acuity Brands has launched a blog at ablbim.wordpress.com to help establish a dialog between designers and the factories. Currently Acuity has Gotham, Hydrel Lithonia and Peerless models available at www.AcuityBrands.com/BIM. 
Litecontrol and Visa Lighting have developed a complete library of models available on their web sites. Con-tech, Kenall and Delray are adding them individually by product. 

Building information modeling covers geometry, spatial relationships, geographic information, quantities and properties of building components (for example manufacturers' details). BIM can be used to demonstrate the entire building life cycle including the processes of construction and facility operation. Quantities and shared properties of materials can easily be extracted. Scopes of work can be isolated and defined. Systems, assemblies, and sequences are able to be shown in a relative scale with the entire facility or group of facilities.

BIM is a process which goes far beyond switching to a new software. It requires changes to the definition of traditional architectural phases and more data sharing than most architects and engineers are used to.

BIM is able to achieve such improvements by modeling representations of the actual parts and pieces being used to build a building. This is a substantial shift from the traditional computer aided draftingmethod of drawing with vector file based lines that combine to represent objects.

Lighting Design

Spectrum Lighting uses two primary programs for our lighting design work, Visual 2.6 and AGi32. Please click on each logo to learn more.

Visual 2.6

The Visual Lighting Design software from Acuity Brands offers the designer tremendous flexibility. As lighting designs have grown more complex, Visual has increased its capabilities. The Visual 2.6 software includes a new lighting calculation engine to dramatically decrease calculation time. If you are a registered Visual user, please make sure to update your software. To become a Visual user, contact Dave Vera, for assistance.

AGi32

Predict lighting system performance for any application from one luminaire in a jail cell to hundreds of luminaires in a professional sports facility. Interior or exterior, AGI32 can build environments for most any electric lighting or daylighting application with unlimited luminaires, calculation points, and reflective or transmissive surfaces. Rendering is one of the strong points of AGi32, contact Ty Schauer for a demonstration.   

Controls Design

Several of our factories offer software to assist in the layout and documentation of our clients lighting controls design.

Leviton offers ASAP Software

Leviton’s exclusive ASAP (online) point-and-click application allows you to quickly and simply design, specify, and enter orders for your lighting control projects. Create a complete submittal package in minutes and enjoy an unheard of seven-day turnaround time so you can deliver a complete lighting controls package to your customers in less time. Sensor selection and payback analysis can be tedious and time consuming. Let Leviton Dollars Sensors software help you select the appropriate units for your jobs. Download it today at Leviton.com. The Occupancy Sensor Layout Tools, also available at Leviton.com, will assist you in the correct sizing and placement of you sensors, eliminating the guess work too often associated with sensor layout design.

Unity™ Lighting Control Software bundles Design (specification), Programming and Management of a lighting control system into a single software package. It’s free. And it requires no formal training. Specifiers use our Unity Software to rapidly design a new lighting control system. Unity files may be saved and output to AutoCAD in only seconds. Log on to www.lightingcontrols.com to download your copy today.