ABSTRACT
Ten years ago while attending a lighting convention, I sat in on a discussion of the newest innovations in automated lighting technology. At the end of the seminar I remember a well-respected LD was asked what he thought the Holy Grail of automated lighting was. He said that in the next ten to fifteen years all lights will be digital. He described a system where instead of using mechanical functions and glass to change the output of a fixture, everything will be generated in a video-like format. These digital lighting fixtures would be more than just a video projector on a yoke, as they would contain specific software to enable them to behave as lighting fixtures. Any image, any texture, any color could be projected with no limits. I was thrilled by this vision and hoped it would come true sooner than later.
