Sharing
Perth 10th April 2013
While I am preparing some presentations for upcoming speaking engagements and doing a remote magazine interview, I am very much aware that as we grow older, supposedly wiser and have more experience, we have the duty to share this with our industry and beyond. I feel it is a shame to keep all your knowledge in your head just for you to use. Some people are afraid to share as they believe that it’s personal knowledge that is part of their value as a designer. True, but that does not mean you cannot share…one of the key reasons for writing my blog is to share my experience as a lighting designer, to create better awareness of the benefits of better an sustainable lighting, to make people understand the added value that good lighting design can bring to our living environment. For that I have to share.
By sharing you also need to stay ahead of the game. In order to share 100% I need to be 150% on top of my game. I have found that sharing my knowledge and experience as a lighting designer, makes me stop and reflect on what I am doing, it makes me think and educate myself more on issues that I want to share my concerns with. In order to write an article about lighting design I need to know and make sure I have got my facts right. In order to do a guest presentation at a major lighting event I need to be fully knowledgeable about what I am going to share with the attending public. I am sharing to educate, I am sharing to motivate, I am sharing to encourage and show ways to solutions. I am there as a professional representative of my profession as lighting designer, therefore the task of sharing knowledge is a serious one. Boasting how good I am, is not sharing, that is ego tripping! After more than 30 years in the lighting design business I am privileged with the knowledge and experience I have, I find it extremely rewarding to share and motivate the new generation of lighting designers. And you know what, by sharing I learn as well…
Light Watch 4-62: Designers keep on coming up with interesting new concepts. 3kta (http://3kta.net/3syndyn.php) developed this racket game with lights, that combined with sound produces very cool images.
http://vimeo.com/user2479794/syndyn
Dressed for the job
Perth 9th April 2013
Don’t know what’s going on with the weather, but it seems like rather extreme opposites right now! We had a white Easter with snow and freezing temperatures in Europe just a week ago and we are having tropical summer temperatures in the high 30 degrees here in Perth! Europe in April should be nice with pleasant spring temperatures, likewise Australia should be nice with pleasant autumn temperatures. It was 38 degrees yesterday and close to that today again…nice to have a beach not far away 🙂
Our work goes on rain or shine. We don’t really have a dress code other then that it should be comfortable and representable when we visit our clients. As designers in principle we can get away with anything as long as it looks decent and cared for. But with this weather even-though we have air-conditioning, it is nice to put on a pair of board shorts and a T-shirt, nice and comfortable…my little kitchen provides me with the drinks and refreshments. We are a creative design studio so our attire and work attitude should allow us to feel comfortable and motivated. That gets the creative juices flowing.
I have never insisted on my staff to dress a certain way. The way you dress is also an expression of your personality, so as long as it is not offensive and decent I have no issues. In my early days in corporate Philips I was sort of pressured in wearing a tie, not so much verbally as well as through peer pressure…everyone was wearing one. Having a beard at the time was already pretty progressive. Now its reversed, the lesser hair on your head (bald/ crew cut is in) except for beards which are making a come back. I won’t have one…had one for more then 20 years…
Many years ago I was contemplating to shave of my beard just before I was due for a major keynote presentation. When my host got wind of it he asked me to please keep my beard; I looked much more like a professor and more credible! Besides that all the announcements had gone out with my bearded image…so I trimmed it, but kept it. After 9-11 however I got rid of my beard permanently …no associations 🙂
Light Watch 4-61: There is nothing more pure then natural light and for that matter a sunrise or sunset. People cant stop from taking in the moment…After a hot day day in meetings and in the office I ended on the beach (in a state of “undress”) for a swim at sunset.
Rijks Museum re-opens
Perth 8th April 2013
As a Dutchman I cann’t but be proud of our famous Rijks Museum. It will be re-opened next week after 10 years of rebuilding, renovation and restoration. The news from the last few days not surprisingly has been very forward about the new LED lighting. The museum, known for the world’s largest collection of Rembrandt paintings, closed in 2003 and now, after completion of the renovations, will finally re-open. Many of the original features were restored and the 19th century building has been transformed into a modern interior that blends 19th century grandeur with modern 21st century design according to the news reports.
Some of the famous paintings like the Nacht Wacht were relocated either to a temporary storage or went around the world in touring exhibitions. I have to admit it has been a very long time since I visited the Museum, but now, equipped with the new LED lighting, I have to make it a point to visit during my next visit to Holland, simply to see if the LED lighting matches up with its billing. Honestly, I have my doubts, just looking from the pictures I saw, but then these can be very deceiving. LED is a totally new technology and I just have a suspicion that it does not yet has that depth of optical performance (a combination of pure accent lighting, colour and softness that we know from incandescent lighting technology). I may well be proven wrong. I just speak from my knowledge of the LED lighting technology that I know today. Specifically the beam and glare control are critical in museum lighting and very little LED systems have that optical performance required.
According to Philips promotional statement the lighting uses 750,000 LED’s to light up more than 7500 artefacts over 9500m2 of gallery space. It is promoted as the worlds most advanced LED system and designed to closely mimic the colour rendition of museum lighting allowing visitors to see details of master pieces that were previously not visible! That is a bold but expected statement…I look forward to visit the Museum.
Light Watch 4-60: Below some of the pictures that have been circulated in the news about the upcoming re-opening.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YyTWz7s-C_k
Majet again!
Jakarta 5th April 2013
As I write my blog I have just spent another two hours in the car on my way to the airport for my flight back to Singapore. Another mega “majet” (traffic jam)…I barely managed to check in before closure of the counter, phew…and considering it is the last flight out for the day with this airline, I was rather fretting and stressing the last few kilometres! I really don’t understand how people can live or work in Jakarta..i had good meetings today in Jakarta but considering the effort (2 hours drive to and from the airport plus the frustratingly slow traffic movement in Jakarta, you cannot really call it super productive.
Technically we don’t really bill our clients for the lost hours spent in the plane, train, car or taxi. It sort of comes with the territory, but if you start analysing the hours spent in motion from your office or home to your client and back and then charge an hourly rate it would be quite shocking I think. We do charge our clients a lump sum fee in general for attending meetings specifically the ones overseas, but at times these amounts look so out of proportion in relation to our fees (they can sometimes be up to half our fees!), that we willingly reduce these to not scare of our clients.
There is a trade off of course as while you travel for your client to a country you generally are able to piggy back some other meetings with potential clients or other relevant meetings in your free time. Today was no different. Note that in overseas projects our time involvement in attending meetings is generally limited to once a month or so. But when you do a project in your “home” country you are more or less expected to attend weekly meetings, which often render these kind of project less effective, less respectful and more time consuming. In contrast overseas meetings are generally efficient to the point and productive. Everyone is aware of each-others precious time as we all know we have only a short time span within to discuss or resolve all projects issues. Meetings are therefore conducted with much more respect and attention. So I take today’s majet in my stride… have great “stress”-less weekend!
Light Watch 4-59: As lighting designers we deal with many developing countries and for many 5-star hotels and resort luxury is a far away dream. It is therefore great t see a development like the Gravity Light, an invention that powers light by gravity (weight). A bit like the pendulum clock. The weight allows for about 30 minutes of lighting after which you need to “rewind”
Cheap for cheap sake
Bali 4th April 2013
My discussions with local suppliers here in Bali brought up another interesting approach to lighting sales. One of the suppliers I interviewed openly professed the strategy to buy cheap. Never mind if it fails, rots away or needs replacement. His sales’ pitch was that it is still much cheaper to buy the same fitting 2-3 times, than spending a lot of money for an expensive fitting. Basically saying that his fittings are about 3-4 times cheaper than the sort of quality/ performance level we would specify. I guess it keeps his business going and you would be surprised how many property owners fall for that pitch! Pay $25 for a down light now instead of $100 (save $75) and you can reinstall failing lights up to four times without spending more money. Sounds good, no?
What the whole approach fails to identify is the related peripheral hassle and frustration. Besides the obvious fact that the lighting effects are unlikely to be achieved due to poor performance and quality, there is a host of issues that are related to the “cheap” lighting, many of them related to public safety and security. As a property owner of a public space, you have the responsibility to make sure your premises are safe! Having fittings with poor electrical qualities that can easily break or damage pauses a both a maintenance as well as a public safety hazard. Most of the time owners that go for the cheap fittings are also likely to follow through with cheap installation contractors…I don’t have to spell out to what that leads!
I need to clarify that I am not professing that high quality expensive fittings are the only solution. Taking cars as a metafoor, the fittings have to be road worthy and comply with basic safety norms. A Suzuki Swift can be as good a solution as a Mercedes Station Wagon when it comes to going from A to B. However comfort, drive experience and quality will be totally different. The thing that they both have in common is compliance to safety and security. The same for lighting. Cheap is great and acceptable as long as it complies with basic safety. Unfortunately the cheap for cheap sake types are not…
Light Watch 4-58: Lighting is very much about the effects and moods that it produces, that is what affects our performance and arouses our human/ visual interest. Many suppliers seem to forget that and only look at technical specifications and price. Some effect images from Google…
ROI Warranty
Bali 3rd April 2013
Now here is an interesting approach to warranty. I met with several local lighting suppliers today to get a better feel on how to approach my specifications and long term maintenance recommendations. If my project is in Bali there is no point in specifying lights that can only be ordered from the US or Europe, at least for your general lighting types. So I always make it a point to catch up with the locally based suppliers, the ones literally having office “around the corner’, say within an hours’ drive of the site. These meetings can be illuminating to say the least as these are generally the people that (after you have gone, commissioned the project) that the maintenance engineers will turn to for their immediate lamp/ luminaire replacement needs; they generally don’t call Jakarta or even further away. They need their support locally…
So one of the local suppliers I met this morning, according to his explanations and the website I later checked (having a proper website is already a good sign…) specialised in LED lighting only (surprise, surprise). My first thought was, oh no probably another of those LED Cowboys…While only in business for about 5-6 years, their background in electronics and lighting controls looked promising. Still lot to learn in regards to lighting fitting design (all is locally assembled and tested), but again promising.
What struck me was his approach to warranty. Many promise a lot but deliver little. His approach to me was novel; he linked his warranty to the ROI (return on investment) of the product. In other word he would calculate the ROI and would then provide his warranty to minimally cover the ROI period, making sure the client would earn back his money, the additional cost of LED (yes you can calculate the ROI in many way, I know, but it’s the idea). So say if his ROI calculation would be 2.5 year he would give 3 years, something like that. There are always terms and conditions, but the idea is interesting and possibly worth some further consideration!
Light Watch 4-57: Being in a resort out in the sun away from the city made me think of the things people do to escape city life; and one of these things is building tree houses…adult versions of what some of us did when we were kids…
Business and pleasure
Bali 2nd April 2013
The benefit of doing projects all over the world is that you go places, sometimes repeatedly to the same (enjoyable) place. After the Good Friday -Easter long weekend I travelled back to Bali yesterday to start what is going to be a “tough” week in Bali. As I write this blog my hair (the little that I have left 🙂 ) is still wet as I have just come out of a little pool break. I am at an undisclosed Bali resort for business…and having walked around all day, parts of it with the hotel engineer, examining and assessing the current state of the lighting, I needed to refresh a bit, relax a bit as I have still a bit of work ahead this evening. As lighting designers our job is to make sure lighting looks good at night so a good part of our time is often spent at night. But as we don’t work normal hours (add to that the many crazy hours of travelling) it is a must to sort of balance business and pleasure and being at a resort in Bali does not leave much to the imagination when it comes to relaxing a bit in between work. So with the night already set I took a dip in the illuminated pool and floated belly up watching the stars…yes Bali still has nice clear skies with a reasonable starry sky at night…
Of course emerging oneself in resort life also helps understand what people do and how they experience the resort. We design for people not for lux meters is one of my standard quotes…so getting to know what people do, how they use spaces, is elementary as Dr Watson would say. Going to the seaside restaurant later on for my dinner is similarly part of assimilating what’s going on in the resort and my little black notebook (yes I still write…) is never far away. Just earlier I saw a band setting up camp on the function lawn in front of the restaurant, no doubt to entertain the guests. However there is hardly any lighting provision so I guess it will be more about the sounds and smells, rather then any visual experience. Nothing some candle light can’t fix…
Light Watch 4-56: Even without any work done there is a good basic infra structure from the original design that allows you to shoot some mood pictures….
Clients
Singapore 28th March 2013
My last blog of the month already…with Good Friday tomorrow and the Easter Holidays, my next working day will be in April…
In our projects we deal with all sorts of clients; sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly. The thing is that clients all have their own attitudes and personalities. Some are easy to deal with some are plain difficult. Some are approachable, some only communicate through their PA or PM. The ones that respect your expertise are generally the ones that are easiest to work with, provided you deliver of course! The longer the communication chain, the longer the decision making process, that’s obvious. This holds for approvals of all matters, design as well as payments. A big corporate chairman does not generally wait for you until you to be ready, he’s got a life and if anything you have to wait for them to be ready for you to present. Often you are given a last minute notice with a ridiculous deadline. We have all been there…
A design concept is first being coordinated with your immediate project team members, interior designer, architect etc. At the same time you make sure the project manager and the operator (if involved) are on the same page as well. Nothing is more humiliating in my opinion than to make a presentation to the client and then having to face comments and criticisms on your proposed concept from your “team” mates. So making sure you have coordinated the concept with the rest of the team is vital before doing any client presentation! That is if you get to present to the client! It would not be the first time I present my concept to a second or third tier client representation, who of course all have to show off that they have something to say, often “deconstructive” rather than constructive…It has happened to me before that we were directed by the clients representative into a certain direction, only to be redirected later in a totally different direction by the chairman when we eventually got to present to him….
In the end if you deliver the goods many of the clients remain great business relations with repeat work, but it can take a long time to build mutual trust and respect…
Light Watch 4-55: Good clients can be your ticket to the moon! As we are just having a full moon here are some pictures from Russian avant garde artist Leonid Tishkov, who create his private art installation called: private moon. He took the art installation across the globe…Good night!
Life Endangering Diodes (LEDs)
Singapore 27th March 2013
Or should I say Life Endangering Duds. Maybe some of you may have some better acronyms… Fact is that in recent months more and more life endangering situations have surfaced in regards to the safe and reliable use of LEDs. I blogged 2 days ago about the recent recall in the US; now another leading LED manufacturer has just recalled it’s GU10 LED’s from the market. Sadly, I am sure there is still heaps more to come. One of the reasons that we are hearing about it now in increasing ways I believe, is that major public companies are involved, not just your little black smith from around the corner. We are talking major brands and quantities.
It is obvious to me that the pace of development and market demand (created by the big manufacturers themselves!!!) are now largely outrunning the manufacturer’s capacities to coop with proper product development, which is becoming a scary thought. In order to fulfil demand products are being launched in the market without being properly out-developed, possibly even without having been properly quality tested. It generally takes months and months to get the proper test and compliance certificates from the authorised testing labs. It is for sure that we are not talking about the traditional 2 year product development cycle anymore! I suspect that the major manufacturers outsource a lot of their LED production to third parties to speed up the process. We have just seen to what that can lead…
As a result we are finding ourselves at the short end of the stick. The consumers with unsafe and faulty products and we as lighting designers with product specifications we can no longer trust! As a result we have clients questioning our knowledge and expertise. I have had to replace LED’s in my projects over the past year, major brand LED’s, LED’s I tested with the manufacturers involved prior to specifying, but still they failed within months of installation, making us look like fools!
I have made this plea before and make it again: I implore the manufacturers to work with the lighting designers, to share their REAL knowledge of the product with us, rather than “using” us to specify products they know are not making the cut! Please level with us, together we have much more to gain!
Light Watch 4-54: As I was searching for images I suddenly thought of LED Zeppelin, the famous 70ties rock band. This whole LED thing can either be a “stairway to heaven” or come down as a lead balloon! I leave you with some images which show Led Zeppelin was way ahead of its time 🙂
Seasonal impacts
Singapore 26th March 2013
The good news today is that some clients seem to have woken up from hibernation…some long outstanding payments start coming in and some clients seem to move into action in regards to projects. From my observation it really seems that there are seasons when it comes to our project work, which seem closely linked to holiday periods and “cultural seasons”. There is definitely a hiatus between Xmas and Chinese New Year. Hardly anything gets done, little is moving. Then come March things get back on track. In the past couple of weeks we have done more than 20 fee proposals, projects have finally started to actually move again, appointments being confirmed, payments finally settled! The busy season is upon us; we can expect a busy time between now and middle of the year. Then western summer holidays set in and we plunge again in a much slower pace, sometimes simply because key decision makers are away on holiday. Come September its then back in action till end of the year. For western background companies there is last minute rush to get things out of the way and finished before Xmas and New Year, for Asian background companies the same happens just before Chinese New Year. These are the typical seasons for you; at least that’s how we experience it in our practice, with exceptions of course.
But there also is something like a financial season; certainly when it comes to big multi-national companies or government organisations. They are clogged into bureaucracy when it comes to financing and payments. There is the end of financial year (generally June or December) which triggers a lock down when it comes to anything related to financing or payments. Often budgets are allocated on a yearly basis end towards the end of financial year there is either nothing left or they are in a hurry to finish the balance of the budget. If you are unlucky with all budget committed, then you need to make sure you educate your client on the budgets required for the next financial year (for your part of the works!) Many companies also have only one time a month when they execute pay settlements. You miss the cut-off date you’re in the wait for another month!
There are definitely seasonal impacts work wise, pay wise. Some are yearly, twice yearly on a macro level; some are monthly or weekly on a micro level…
Light Watch 4-53: Last Saturday was Earth Day and some great photo’s from before and after from landmarks around the world not only illustrate the energy and light pollution issue but in a way also how much light brings out and validates architecture at night. See the link to these interactive pictures: http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2013/03/earth-hour-2013/100479/
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