LED Lighting Supply / Photometric Plan

Photometric Plan

Get Your Custom Lighting Plan With Product Recommendations

A photometric lighting plan created by our lighting designers is the first step when adding or upgrading existing lighting in your facility. The photometric plan confirms important attributes including your project’s light intensity and distribution. Let our experts design a lighting plan for your project. Trusted by contractors.
  • Professionally Designed Lighting Layout
  • Fixture Count & Recommendation
  • Improved Energy Efficiency & Reduced Maintenance

Dedicated Sales Support

Every lighting plan comes with a dedicated product specialist, providing personalized service and expert advice for your project needs.

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How long does it take to get a plan?

1-2 for indoor and 2-3 days for outdoor projects

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OUR CUSTOMERS

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customer brand 1 customer brand 2 customer brand 3 customer brand 4 customer brand 5 customer brand 6 customer brand 7 customer brand 8 customer brand 9 customer brand 10 customer brand 11 customer brand 12 customer brand 13 customer brand 14 customer brand 15 customer brand 16 customer brand 17 customer brand 18 customer brand 19 customer brand 20 customer brand 21 customer brand 22 customer brand 23 customer brand 24 customer brand 25 customer brand 26 customer brand 27 customer brand 28 customer brand 29 customer brand 30 customer brand 31 customer brand 33 customer brand 34 customer brand 35 customer brand 36
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CBRE Company Logo CBRE needed high quality lighting for their customer, with stock available for ongoing projects.
Smithfield Company Logo Customer had an urgent need for high temperature lights. We had them in stock & shipped out next day.
Oakland Arena Logo Poor lighting caused parking lot safety issues for spectators. Our lighting plan & new lights resulted in an improved experience.
Armag Corporation Logo Customer needed to source large quantities of specialty fixtures for use in their manufactured products.
Tracy Electric Logo Tracy Electric was seeking a reliable source for ongoing lighting projects.
Wesco Distribution Logo Distributors partner with us to provide customers a high quality product at a reasonable price.
Dixie Electrical Supply Logo Repeat lighting supplier for an electrical contractor working in manufacturing facilities.
Florida State University Logo Permanent tent lighting for large acrobatics facility. Our lighting plan & recommendations resulted in ideal performer & spectator safety.

What is a Photometric Plan?

A Photometric Lighting Plan is a digital software report that shows a proposed LED lighting solution placed within an indoor or outdoor area. This lighting analysis lets you view the lighting level before work begins on a job site.

The software is capable of importing layouts, CAD diagrams, and even scaled Google Maps of outdoor areas – particularly interesting when creating lighting plans for outdoor sports facilities using LED sports lighting.

The software can place the fixtures inside the plan at specific locations and heights. They can be oriented and aimed. The lighting plan calculates foot-candle light levels, shows how balanced the light is, and provides a comprehensive printable PDF report.

Photometric lighting isn’t just a type of lighting or a design style. Photometric lighting is the study of how light emanates from a fixture into the environment. Knowledge related to photometric lighting is reserved for anyone who works with fixtures.

What is Photometric Analysis?

A photometric lighting analysis helps understand how the light from the fixture surrounds the area of coverage. It’s a popular hack used by light designers to visualize what the space will look like after fixtures have been installed.

What is a Lighting Layout Calculator?

A lighting layout calculator is another way of saying “Lighting Plan”. Some sites provide some basic lighting calculators, which are good tools for basic budgetary calculations based on light levels needed when you provide some basic data about the light you might use. It is NOT a replacement for a lighting plan. We would never use an LED lighting layout calculator in place of a lighting plan.

Other similar related terms – LED light spacing calculator and free lighting layout tool.

What Customer Types are Eligible for Free Photometric Plans?

We offer free lighting plans for contractors and end users for commercial, industrial, and sport lighting projects.

For residential customers, we can offer free plans for horse arenas, pole barns, and shops. We do not do lighting plans for homes, apartment units, condo units, or townhome units.

We are unable to provide free lighting plans to architects and design engineers, as the full project plans are usually unknown at this early stage and require extensive non-design work.

What Can I Expect with the Results of a Lighting Plan?

The results of each plan are specific to the particular space dimensions and fixture model, wattage, lumens, optic used, color temperature, and mounting angle used.

You should not expect the same lighting results indicated by the lighting plan if the fixture is swapped out for another fixture.

When Do I Need a Photometric Plan?

A lighting plan would be highly recommended before any lighting project is started, and before any lights are purchased. It will provide you with most of the information you need to make an informed decision.

What is the Difference Between a Lighting Design Calculator and a Lighting Plan?

Use a calculator if:

  • You are looking for a free, online tool to quickly calculate the number of fixtures you need
  • You want quick, simple, and immediate results
  • You are looking for a count of light fixtures needed based on a specific budget
  • You need a rough estimate on quantity and layout/configuration does not matter
  • There is no need to include specific light balance and shadows in your documentation

Use a lighting plan layout if:

  • You would like a professional lighting plan engineer to review your requirements
  • You need a calculated lighting plan that shows foot candle readings
  • You need to see how balanced the light levels are, and you care about reducing shadows
  • You want to show aiming angles, and light positions in scale within your indoor or outdoor area
  • You need professional assurance that the lights you buy will be the right choice

Technical Lighting Plan Terms You Should Know

One of the biggest challenges of buying new lighting or upgrading to LED lighting from existing fixtures is anticipating how your new lights will look and function in your space. Luckily, there is a solution.

A Photometric Lighting Plan is a software report of LED Lights placed within an indoor or outdoor area. Using a special lighting software program, you can create a simulation of an indoor room or an outdoor area. The software is capable of importing layouts, CAD diagrams, and even scaled Google maps of outdoor areas – particularly interesting when creating lighting plans for outdoor sports facilities.

The software can place the fixtures inside the plan at specific locations and heights. They can be oriented and aimed. The lighting plan calculates foot-candle light levels, shows how balanced the light is,  and provides a comprehensive printable PDF report.

Lighting Terms

  • Lumen –  A lumen is a unit of light. By itself it’s useless, but it becomes useful when it defines the collective lumens produced by 1 fixture or bulb. It is the amount of visible light that a fixture emits.
  • Foot Candle –  A foot-candle is a measurement of light at a specific location, and 1 – many lights can contribute to the specific foot candle reading at that location. Foot candles (or its equivalent LUX) are the requirement that most are looking for when they describe a light level for a project, facility, or location.
  • Beam Angle -The beam angle of a lamp is the angle at which the light is distributed or emitted. This can be done with additional optics, or as is the case with LEDs, by engineering the light in a specific way. LEDs have an extremely large range of available beam angles.

How to Read a Photometric Plan?

A lighting plan won’t provide you any benefit unless you know how to read it.

If this will be your first LED Lighting Supply photometric plan, it may seem like a bunch of complex figures and statistics. However, it isn’t as difficult to understand as you might think.

Refer to the lighting plan for the basketball gymnasium on the right as we share some terms to familiarize yourself with how these plans work. There are 4 main parts of every lighting plan.

how to read a photometric plan

1. Foot Candle Measurements

A foot-candle represents the amount of light that reaches a surface area, and it’s measured in lumens per square foot. In the above plan, you’ll see that there are several reading points within the lighting plan. These represent the foot candle readings for each specific point. And if you’d rather look at the layout in meters, the software can also calculate lux instead of foot-candles.

Lighting Plan Footcandles

2. The Fixtures

The light fixtures, arguably the most important thing on a photometric lighting plan, are shown as red dots. The dots show where the light fixtures should be located to give the optimal lighting coverage.

Fixtures can be swapped out and plans recalculated to find ideal lighting for specific environments and areas.

Lighting Plan Fixture

3. The Schedule

This is an extremely important part of a lighting plan that is often overlooked. The schedule is found at the bottom left of your lighting plan, and it goes into further detail about the types of fixtures recommended in the lighting plan.

Lighting Plan Schedule

4. The Calculation

This is where some of the most valuable information in the lighting plan is found. This section is found on the right of the schedule and identifies the light levels and distribution ratios of the fixtures outlined in the schedule. It provides some useful information about the foot candle measurements in the plan, including the average, maximum, and minimum. These numbers are often used to ensure that projects are in accordance with building codes.

Out of these numbers, the average is the most significant. This is the ideal or “target” foot candle reading for the entire project. We can then calculate an Average/Minimum foot candle reading, which shows us how much the dimmest spot differs from the average.

The Max/Min ratio is also important, as it shows the overall lighting distribution for the space. Building codes are made so that buildings have an even distribution, which helps with visual comfort and safety.

Lighting Plan Calc

Lighting Plan Considerations

Inadequate Light Levels or Spotty Distribution

Bad distribution and poor lighting levels are a major issue in the lighting industry. Many facility managers who are looking to convert to LED lighting end up buying products online without going through a proper analysis. They make assumptions about what should work in their space, and encounter problems once they have bought and installed the new lighting. We end up hearing the following complaints often:

  • It’s too bright.
  • It’s not bright enough.
  • The light is not uniform.
  • The light is too bright beneath the fixture.

This is why we always suggest a photometric lighting plan. Otherwise, there is no sure way to know what your outcome will be. Even though some suppliers will suggest that many fixtures aren’t all that different from each other – we know that couldn’t be farther from the truth.

The only way to accurately predict how your lights will look is to have an in-depth understanding of how light behaves in large spaces. But unless you are a lighting engineer, this information is out of your wheelhouse. And, that’s where the photometric lighting plan comes in. A photometric lighting plan takes everything into account and does the math for you so that you can make an informed lighting purchase, whether or not you’re a lighting engineer.

The issue with buying lighting fixtures online is that you can’t be 100% sure of what you are buying. A lot of time manufacturers will sell old inventory with outdated features and old chipsets. It may seem like a bargain, but you’ll quickly realize that you’ve made a huge mistake.

Understanding Your Current Light Levels

You can’t understand where you’re going if you don’t understand where you’ve been. Alright, that’s not exactly how the saying goes, but it does still apply here. To understand light levels let’s introduce the concept of foot candles or lux. They are the same thing: light measurements.

You can take light readings using a handheld light meter or an app on your smartphone. A free light meter app gives some reliable basic readings, but if you have a complex light environment or want to be completely sure, we recommend investing in a light meter.

For example, you may have a production facility and are looking to upgrade to LED Shop Lights. A good process would be to install a light meter app on your phone and use it to take several readings around your facility. Go under a light, go between lights, go into the center of the space, go to the edge, and take readings.

From this, you will get a good idea of how your current lighting is performing, and your current light levels. But you can also use this method to determine things like:

  • Are my light levels OK, too bright, or too dim?
  • Are my light levels pretty uniform and evenly distributed?
  • Would I like to improve the light levels, or are things OK?

Racetrack Lighting Plan

Final Thoughts on Lighting Plans

How Do You Create a Photometric Plan?

We create lighting plans using highly specialized lighting design software called AGI32 by Lighting Analysts. This program allows us to model spaces, add lights, and calculate the light levels and light balance across the plan. We can easily add/remove and swap/switch fixtures within the plan until the correct light levels and balance are achieved.

How Can I Get A  Photometric Lighting Plan?

There are many consultants who you can pay to run a lighting plan. But, using our fixtures, we can create for you a commercial lighting, sports lighting, or industrial lighting design plan.

How Much Does a Photometric Plan Cost?

That depends on who develops the plan. They can cost between $500 and $2000 if you use a specialized lighting design company. Some of our competitors charge you for the plan and then credit you back the cost when you purchase.

We provide plans for free – with a few exceptions. We do not provide plans to individuals and companies only looking to have a plan done and with no intention of ever purchasing.

Our services are meant for customers who intend to purchase but want to make sure our lights will meet their needs. And, we do not provide plans for lights we do not sell.

We also do not provide lighting plans for engineers and architects who just need a lighting plan to satisfy their requirements for their customers.

How Do You Calculate Lumens for a Photometric Site Plan?

You should note that 1 lumen per square foot is the same as a 1-foot candle. So, when you read a lighting plan, and see the average foot candles is, for example, 40, that’s the same as saying 40 lumens per square foot.

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