As promised, here are my IES Conference notes! If you missed the Conference in Minneapolis two weeks ago, you missed a good one. If you were there, feel free to add comments about the seminars and paper sessions you attended.

For me, the Conference began on Saturday when we hosted 40 students and emerging lighting professionals with a full day of topics designed just for them. We toured an award-winning U of M campus building, had portfolio reviews, and gave everyone time to "speed network" with all kinds of lighting professionals. Our opening keynote speaker is an emerging professional herself - Maja Petric shared her inspirational use of light in her art. Her most architectural work used LED light to pour through cracks in a tunnel ceiling to illuminate the inside of the tunnel. The color temperature and intensity of the light changes throughout the day to mirror the current outdoor light conditions. See that project and more of her beautiful work here. It was her work that inspired me to post this.

When the Conference-proper kicked off on Sunday, we danced the night away to the delightful sounds of Stefan Graf's lighting industry band, Black Body Locusts. Special thank you's go to Naomi Miller for writing hilarious lighting lyrics for the band to sing and to Lance Bennett / Cooper Lighting for sponsoring the band!

The next day the dean of the University of Minnesota School of Design, Thomas Fisher, challenged us to not just problem solve, but problem seek. Design thinking is valuable beyond the making of things. He even wondered if universities should be restructured - not around disciplines, but around world challenges. In this format, the iterative process of abductive reasoning could be put to work: seeing connections between things that are seemingly different. Who knows the discoveries that would follow? Are we defining our industry correctly? Is it lighting? Or perhaps we are in the human productivity business? This led the way for professor Blaine Brownell to describe the lighting immersion project created by his architectural students. They gather all kinds of materials and, working in teams, build a light of some kind. Some of the projects make statements, some are portable, some explore the idea of light as an object that occupies space rather than illuminating it. All of these projects are unexpected and creative. For more from Blaine Brownell, start here then read one of his books.

Next I attended the "LIGHT+ SENIORS Symposium Summary and Review." All I can say is - wow - am I ever sorry I missed the symposium! The Summary and Review was so full of information that I'll revisit this one later in a blog post all its own.

If I thought I was mentally saturated before the "Smart Lighting - Beyond Ordinary" session, I certainly was afterward. This future-casting session covered everything from the invention of LED to synthetic LED skylights (light + video) to the use of blue light "patches" for pain therapy (light + medicine) and of course, the new hue LED from Philips sold in your local Apple store (light + apps.) Light carries information. Imagine one day using our light sources instead of broadband... It's all about the fusion of lighting and other disciplines. Are you catching the theme? The whole conference theme of synapses and connections was repeated through many sessions where interdisciplinary interaction was lauded and encouraged.

Monday night's entertainment was a private screening of the documentary The City Dark. It was fun seeing some of our very own IES Conference attendees (Howard Brandston) on the big screen. The movie itself pits lighting on earth against the night sky's fading natural lights and challenges us to balance the two. Heavy.

The next morning's keynote speaker was Mark Major who picked up the dark sky theme with excerpts from a National Geographic article on Light Pollution. What should we be more afraid of? The dark? Or what we are doing to the night? The work of Speirs + Major is always breathtaking, and hearing this one presentation was worth every penny I spent on the entire conference.

In the next session, I was privileged to introduce my fellow KU alumnus, Zachary Suchara, who spoke on human factors in lighting. When was the last time you considered your humanity as it relates to lighting? Humans are phototropic. Exactly how we experience light varies based on where we live on the planet. Zach had many other fascinating points including this one: In the past 20 years, there have been more new lamp types developed than in all the other years of human history put together. He closed the session with a great case study in which the developers exploited the human factor by turning the building systems into a game. Tenants in the building actually compete with each other to see who can use the least energy. It reminded me a little of watching the gauges on our Toyota Prius to see how many miles per gallon we can get per trip.

The Conference included many more papers, some political pundits, the always-popular Progress Committee presentation, a wonderful Illumination Awards dinner, other Society Awards, and lots of networking. For me, it was one of the best IES Conferences ever. How about for you?

'Tis the Season to Recycle!  Reduce waste and spread cheer this holiday season by donating your broken or unwanted holiday lights to St. Louis Green's 2012 Holiday Light Recycling Drive!  This year, St. Louis Green hopes to divert over 128,000 pounds of lights from entering our landfills.  And not only does the Drive help protect the environment, but it also helps feed the hungry. A portion of proceeds from the drive is donated to Operation Food Search, helping those less fortunate to have a happier holiday season.  Learn more at http://www.stlouisgreen.com/Holiday-Light-Recycling-Drive.

Recently I have been experiencing some creative restlessness, but earlier this week I attended the IES Annual Conference where I was reminded of the magic that first attracted me to lighting. 

I must apply this revitalized creative energy to my first art (my head is swimming with knowledge and inspiration, but my desk is full of work) so visit the blog again soon for more post-IES Conference musings.

There are three viable major categories of incandescent lamp replacements available today. Think of it like an election. 
Consider all of the options and then make your selection - cast your vote. Sometimes, like in an election, you may have to pick the best of the worst...but you do have a choice, so your duty is to become informed about those options before making your selection.

This lamp type is most similar to incandescent in cost, color, physical appearance, light, dimming behavior, 
technology...in nearly every way. Halogen is about 30% more efficient than standard incandescent and lasts about 
twice as long. The advantages and disadvantages almost perfectly align with advantages and disadvantages of incandescent lamps. They provide instant-on light. They are fully dimmable, The color rendering (CRI) is 100. With 
incandescent or halogen, there are no color temperature options They do not require a ballast. They are mercury free, 
TCLP and RoHS compliant. They are not sensitive to ambient temperature. They tend to be sensitive to vibration.. 
They produce heat when they operate. An A-lamp replacement will cost under $2 and will pay you back $3.08 in energy savings over its lifetime.

This lamp type is the one consumers are being told to use instead of incandescent. CFL is about 75% more efficient 
than incandescent and lasts about ten times as long. Their function is actually quite different than incandescent, but 
they have been fairly common for fifteen years now, so people have grown accustomed to their strengths and weaknesses. They aren’t exactly “instant-on”, but require a brief warm-up, so they are not the best option for very transient spaces or spaces controlled by occupancy sensors. They can be partially dimmable with the proper ballast, The color rendering (CRI) can be low - and that is one reason the CFL has gotten a bad reputation, but look for a CFL lamp with a CRI in the mid-80s for satisfactory color rendering. 
Often I hear people say, “I just hate the color of fluorescent light.” Fortunately, fluorescent is available in a variety of colors. Be aware of that and be sure to get a color that you DO like. Once upon a time, lamps available in big box stores did not display the information needed to select the color. But now that is changing. Starting in 2011, the Federal Trade 
Commission began requiring lamp packaging to bear a label like this:

Notice the section called "Light Appearance" which indicates how warm or cool the light looks. The warm colors more closely resemble incandescent.

This will be an even more useful tool when CRI is included, shown as “Color Accuracy” in the above DOE Lighting Facts label for LED. CFL lamps do require a ballast. They are not mercury free, but the small amount of mercury used in a high quality lamp can make it TCLP and RoHS compliant. They are sensitive to ambient temperature, and don’t operate as well in cold weather. However, there are lamp ballast combinations available that work well in temperatures down to -10 degrees F. Compared to incandescents, they are not particularly sensitive to vibration. However, if used in an application where they are turned on and off frequently (less than 3 hours per start) the lamp life will be significantly shortened. A 100W A-lamp replacement will cost about $5 and will pay you back about $50 - $100 in energy savings over its lifetime!

While this replacement option is generally being written off by consumers as too expensive, it is an incredibly hot 
item in the specification market. LED is currently about 85% more efficient than incandescent (and its efficacy is still 
improving because the technology is still young) and lasts about fifty times as long. Unlike fluorescents, they do provide instant-on light. They can be partially dimmable, typically down to 10% with the proper equipment coordination, The color rendering (CRI) is often similar to fluorescent - but look for a CFL lamp with a CRI over 90 for very good color rendering. LED lamps require a driver, which is similar to a ballast. They are mercury free, and unlike all of the other lamps, they are virtually UV and IR free, so they will not fade fabrics or art. They are sensitive to high temperatures, but they love cold weather. Heat is their enemy, and the astute designer will look for good heat-sinking to ensure that LED junction temperature is maintained at its ideal level. They are not particularly sensitive to vibration. Some look yellow when they are not in use. Others are available in a more traditional looking white color. An A-lamp replacement will cost about $25 - $40 and will pay you back about $240 in energy savings over its lifetime!

This is an exciting time in the lighting industry, with the pace of change increasing exponentially! How can you possibly keep up with it all? My recommendation is to hire a lighting designer. It is my job to keep up with all of these changes, and it has been my privilege to share them with you! I believe that the importance of having a lighting designer on your projects will continue to increase as the technology changes, because lighting designers dedicate themselves to the art and technology of light, and can help you avoid the pitfalls of selecting the wrong technology or even the wrong version of the right technology.