Simulation

LDA08 has one of the most impressive, realtime, lighting visualization features I've ever seen. First, it allows you to use up to 64 universes of DMX to control extremely large-scale, realtime visualizations. This feature is opened up even more via its extensive support of DMX-to-Ethernet capture devices such as Enttec, Art-Net, Pathport, and LD-net devices. This makes it affordable to use either existing capture devices or purchase less expensive DMX capture devices to get even more universes.

More importantly, the visualizer can support extremely large rigs without becoming cluttered, confused, or looking like one big blob when all the lights are turned on in a scene. The visualizer supports an impressive falloff shader when you include smoke or haze in the scene. The falloff is so accurate and just transparent enough that you are able to see many fixtures deep through its transparency (which is also adjustable in the volume haze properties of the fixture). Each fixture's atmosphere and lens effects can be independently adjusted using an enormous option list of effects such as lens streaks, stars, glows, rays, flares, volume, and noise, with each feature having up to four adjustment options. All of these effects are used in the realtime visualizer and can have data attached for the database to use.

Once cueing is established, LDA08 has a unique feature that lets you record the entire simulation to an imported music track, cue to it, and then play back in realtime. This feature allows you to really refine a design — all visualized and beating to the music in realtime — before a single fixture is hung. For those without a console or DMX capture unit, you can use and record virtual sliders in each cue to control any part of any fixture without DMX capture. This feature extends to the projection of any WMV movie file on any surface. Not only can you use predefined projectors to project in realtime, but you can also sub out a gobo in any fixture for a movie. The final cued simulations to music can run with the full array of lens and atmospheric effects while you zoom, navigate, or walk though the scene.

Rendering

The renderer is similar to the professional-grade renderers you really only see in products such as AutoCAD, 3ds Max, Viz, and Maya. It not only includes ray tracing (the computation of light rays using refractive and reflective samples), but it also is capable of utilizing Global Illumination (GI) and Final Gather (FG). GI and FG work together. GI simulates direct and indirect bounce of rays and photons as well as their effect on shadows and shaders. Many parameters can be set to maximize the renderings to approach photometric precision accuracy. FG smoothes out the GI rendering by using camera-shot FG points that smooth blended photons and shadows that are cast from GI.

Volumes of options are included in the renderer. You can achieve some of the highest quality renders I've seen in a complete pre-viz stage lighting package here. You can also “region render.” This lets you draw any size box around a particular area in order to tweak a specific area without having to re-render the entire drawing — a major timesaver. The renderer is extremely fast, as it will utilize up to four cores or processors simultaneously. You can planar-map surfaces using planar, cylindrical, spherical, and box projections with the supplied or self-made textures that can include a movie file.

Missing from lighting packages like LDA08 is a true physically-based renderer similar to those found in Mental Ray, VRay, Maxwell, or Pixar's Renderman. You can't emit true photonic energy, cast onto true physical shaders such as die-electric or sub-surface-scattering shaders, or use HDRIs that yield incredibly realistic results. In fact, there are some options in the renderer that are not yet fully utilized by LDA08, but the fact that they are there, ready to be updated, generates much anticipation.

Summary

LDA08 is a well rounded and feature-packed professional lighting application that is also passionately supported. There is a lot to it, and it's to your benefit to be guided through it, but with one phone call, it all made sense to me. Design and Drafting has a free international Skype line for support at no charge.

There are some small issues that any new software package needs to work out, but the company has already made improvements to the package since its release. I'm impressed with nearly every facet of the application, and for the price, it makes it a must have in my small arsenal of lighting drafting packages. The expandability of LDA08 is eminent as the technology and licensing evolve with the host application, so there are some exciting things on the horizon with this product range.