Truth in advertising

dlincecum — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 02:34:00 GMT

Now tell me - really tell me. Has the guy in this ad ever been seen in a technical lighting situation?

Have you seen this ad campaign from Philips? These are some very pretty people - and no offense to us lighting types - but some of these things don't look like they belong! What do you think?

As long as we are on the subject - Here is an ad from the Leviton stand here at LDI.

Can you read the copy? "The only ellipsoidal that lets you change lenses without changing barrels"

IMHO -- This will not appeal to anyone who ever used a fixture where the lenses were moved around to create new field angles. I once worked with a large inventory of some old fixtures that had the "move the lens" feature. (Find out how to move the lenses here) There were many of them that were not really any specific field angle because the lenses were always in some weird position. Leviton is touting as a feature the very problem we thought we solved with the Source Four interchangeable barrel. I do love and respect pure Marketing! Find an angle and stick to it!

Not to create conflict over these issues but sometimes I find them humorous. Perhaps you have heard about the new Enhanced Definition Lens Tube (EDLT) we have made for the Source Four. One of our competitors from down under has fired back on their website.

We developed the EDLT because customers said that sometimes they wished for a better projection image quality from the Source Four. Many customers said it didn't matter most of the time because most images are soft focussed. Sometimes you want crispness.

We looked carefully at Selecon fixtures during the research phase of the project since they have a good image quality. We determined that they were giving up a lot of light (lots) to get the image quality they had (generally perceived to be better than the Source Four imaging.) But we decided we would not sacrifice light. When you need a good image - you need lots of it - and that means lumens - lots of lumens across the field. Enter EDLT. Now look at the Selecon feature. Pay special attention to the lumens and efficiency at the top.

What you see is not always what you are seeing. The Blue line (Selecon) looks better right? But that is not the case. The total lumens is the area below the line. The Source Four has 12887 and the Selecon has 10115. The Source Four is also 25% more efficient.

Now admit it - at first it looks like blue line wins right? But the Source Four is delivering far more light in a flatter field with higher efficiency. Take note that the comparison is at 240V - our worst case scenario for filament box size. Don't over-look the fact that they are comparing a 1kw 250 hour lamp in the Selecon to our 750w 400 hour lamp in the Source Four. But again - you gotta give credit to pure marketing! It looks good, and if I were them I would not change a thing.

These are my observations. What are yours?

Hello and welcome -- also featuring house rules

dlincecum — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 02:05:00 GMT

This is not really my brain, just things I think about and things I want to talk about.

I hope you will talk to me about these things. I plan to capture my random rambling thoughts on lighting and the lighting industry. You can read for free - you'll have to join our community to add your own comments. PLEASE DO. In the near future, we will be opening product forums and more, so joining now is worth your time.

Full Disclosure - I work for ETC and as such will abide by certain rules that we as a company have set for me and my blog.

In general I subscribe to the WOMMA code of ethics. That said, as an employee of ETC I will balance WOMMA's code of ethics with my personal and professional responsibilities to ETC.

My goal is to be open but there may be occasion to keep secrets - for example, I will talk about my work but don't expect me to publish all our product plans.
This one goes for all of us (since you can comment on my blog) - In short, don't be a jerk... In long, do not post any material or links to material that is obscene, defamatory, profane, libelous, threatening, harassing, abusive, hateful or embarrassing to another person or any other person or entity. This includes, but is not limited to, comments regarding ETC, ETC employees, ETC partners and ETC's competitors (it's just not cool). I will treat others as I would want to be treated, please do the same.
I have to respect copyright and so do you. Please do not post any material or content that would violate any copyright law or other intellectual property law.
I'll do my best to cite others and provide links to them.
This blog is not intended to provide technical support for any ETC products. In the event you need technical support or service, please contact ETC Technical Support at 1-800-688-4116 (24/7 I might add!).

Finally, I hope to accomplish a couple of things with this blog;

I hope to start a valuable conversation about our industry. About technology, about culture, about the arts in general and about lighting specifically.
I hope to learn a bit from you - to get feedback, to have an honest dialogue where your thoughts can be heard.
I hope to have fun.

What am I thinking? What are you thinking? : lighting

Truth in advertising

Hello and welcome -- also featuring house rules