Electric Lighting Ecotect

New York City
College of Technology
The City University of New York
Electric Lighting in Ecotect
Architectural technology department
written by Nicole Seekely
revised April 6, 2010 4:14 PM

Notes: Remember, if you want to change your units, go to File - User Preferences - Locali-
sation. You can also change the default zone height in the Modeling tab. You can change
the snap distance in the Cursor Snap tab. I’ve set mine to 3”.
page 2 of 11
Step One:
Create a room by clicking on
the zone button and drawing
a space. Once you’ve clicked
the last point, hit Escape to
finish.
When drawing the zone, you
can type in the values by
moving the cursor in the axis
you want and then type the
distance desired followed by
Enter.

Notes:
page 3 of 11
Step Two:
Create a light at the same
height of the ceiling. To do
this, click on the light button
on the left side of the screen.
Step Three:
Move your cursor over the
point you want the light. It will
automatically be placed on
the ground plan. To change
the height it will be placed,
hold down Ctrl to move the
cursor in the Z axis. This will
allow you to snap to the roof.

Notes:
page 4 of 11
Step Four:
Click once to place the light.
Then hit F6 or F7 to move
to Side/Front view. Click a
second time to place the
direction of the light. You
should see a cone of light.
Click F8 to go back to
Perspective.

Notes: To properly mirror objects, you may need to adjust the mirror origin. Do this by
selecting the Mirror button, then move your cursor over the mirror origin axis until an O ap-
pears. Click your mouse once there and then again at the new origin point. Then click the
two points you want to mirror over.
page 5 of 11
Step Five:
With the light selected, go
to the Object Transforma-
tions tab. Under Linear Array,
specify the spacing and num-
ber of lights you want arrayed.
Then click Create Array.
Step Six:
Move the arrayed lights to
one side of the room if they’re
not already, and mirror them
so that you have two rows.
When mirroring objects, make
sure you have Apply to Copy
box checked

Notes:
page 6 of 11
Step Seven:
You can change the type of
light by adjusting its material.
With the light(s) selected, go
go the Material Assignments
tab. You can choose any of
the premade lights or create
your own.

Notes: Remember to use spacebar to change selected objects.
page 7 of 11
Step Eight:
Select the floor and the go to
the Analysis Grid tab. Select
Display Analysis Grid and
then select Auto-Fit Grid to
Objects. The default should
be okay, but you can adjust
the height if you want (Axial
Offset).

Notes:
page 8 of 11
Step Nine:
At t he bottom of the Analysis
Grid tab, click Perform Calcu-
lation on Lighting Levels.
Step 1 - Electric Light Levels
Step 2 - Over the Analysis
Grid (you can select 3D Ex-
tents, but this will take longer)
Step 3 - High Precision
Step 4 - Calculate It for Me
Step 5, 6, 7 - OK

Notes: The difference between the two rows of lights is because they are two different ma-
terials.
page 9 of 11
Step Ten:
Once the calculation is fin-
ished, you will most likely
have a Daylight Factor Analy-
sis shown. To see just the
electric light levels, scroll to
the Electric Light Levels op-
tion under Data & Scale.

Notes:
page 10 of 11
You can display the lighting
values in 3D by clicking Show
Values in 3D in the Analysis
Grid menu.

Notes:
page 11 of 11
You can export the scene with
electric lights just as before.
Make sure to set your cam-
era, then go to the Export tab,
and export to Radiance.

Electric Lighting Ecotect

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