Lighting Design and AI [25-02]

Are AI tools going to take over our profession ?

It is a legitimate question to ask at this point of time and one I am asking myself regularly. You might say that I am in the twilight of my career, so why would I worry about it, but I do! 

I have lived through the early days of the lighting technology where things were relatively simple. Just a few typical light sources (fluorescent tubes, incandescent and metal halide technology) and straight forward optics. We did manual lighting calculations, had drafting tables for our drawings and used hand sketches, photos and  a slide projector to visualise our concepts. There was a level of satisfaction when you had completed your design works.

Today the technology has evolved to LED’s (many of today’s designers don’t even know what the old technology lights were or could do…), we had to re-learn the creation of lighting effects through trial and error, not helped by unscrupulous manufacturers taking shortcuts in quality and performance in the early days.

The virtual world of the internet, with its seemingly infinite resource of information, ideas and solutions, now aided with artificial intelligence does the thinking and work for us! Software programs create solutions for you, provide you with written summaries and write ups you would not even dream up yourself. 

However, the same saying still holds as for the early computer days, garbage in, is garbage out, in order to get good outcomes, you need to define your inputs diligently and thoughtfully. 

My feeling is that we are killing our innate skills to create and produce! How many people are still able to properly sketch a solution or ideas on a piece of paper (or on a tablet for that matter)? Then, if we let programs like Chat GPT and Mid Journey create work for us, do we have the discipline to actually fact check what is being presented as being correct? We are slowly becoming peer reviewers of computer-generated outcomes! 

Is that stimulating our creative skills? Are we becoming better designers or are we slowly becoming slaves of this “virtual universe”? To remain informed and relevant I recently attended a deep-dive workshop in AI for architecture (and lighting) and it really opened my eyes. The opportunities with AI tools seem limitless and made me super excited about the many new horizons that might open up through these AI tools. 

But we need to keep using you own intelligence to avoid becoming immaterial in the future! If we are to remain in charge of the design process, we need to more actively involve with, understand and take control and manage these tools rather then blindly take AI generated solutions for granted!

At least some one was creative with Chai GPT in above image, we need this human creativity! 😊 

February 2025