A smart sport lighting solution establishes a central nerve system that simplifies infrastructure maintenance, increases the value of lighting systems, and opens up a world of multifaceted opportunities for developing new capabilities and revenue streams. It blurs the line between operational technology (OT) and information technology (IT) to create a lighting infrastructure that enables communication, collaboration, and interoperability between luminaires, their surroundings, and other digital actors. The utilization of interoperable standards, powerful connection platforms, the integration of digital controls, and the deployment of intelligent LED lighting systems all work together to push sports lighting to the forefront of sophistication and sustainability.
A smart sport lighting implementation creates a luminous environment that raises the spectacle of a game to a new level of expectation and drives informed decisions to optimize every aspect of lighting operation by making the most of data streams, processing power, and applications available within and beyond the IP-based network.
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Lighting is crucial to a venue’s ability to provide value
Lighting is an important factor in sporting success. It extends the hours of play in stadiums and other outdoor sports complexes past dusk. Lighting is also required for the use of arenas and other indoor athletic facilities during the day. Sports facilities are designed to attract both athletes and spectators. They are designed to host a variety of sports and recreational activities that have the unique ability to stimulate economic development, link people all over the world, and build social integration, inclusion, and tolerance in a variety of geographical, cultural, and political situations. People visit sports venues to watch or participate in a variety of sports such as soccer, football, basketball, volleyball, baseball, tennis, swimming, bicycle racing, motor racing, horse racing, boxing and wrestling, golf, ice/roller hockey, skating (ice figure, ice and inline speed), badminton, cricket, gymnastics, and track and field.
While a sport has an exceptional ability to attract, mobilize, and inspire people, a sporting event brings people together to celebrate, enjoy, and share through participation or spectation. The FIFA World Cup, Olympic Games, UEFA Champions League, NBA Finals, Super Bowl, MLB All-Star Game, English Premier League fixtures, Formula One Racing, IAAF World Championships, Wimbledon Tennis, Rugby World Cup, and Hockey World Cup are all the rage and simply too good to miss. These events are frequently held during the night. The visual feast is provided by sports lights.
Professional smart sport lighting brings a game’s dynamics to life
The purpose of sport lighting is to produce a luminous environment that meets the visual needs of athletes, spectators, and referees. To ensure vision of the players, playing target, playing field, and surrounding backgrounds, optimal visual conditions must be provided. A suitable visual environment should be supplied so that spectators may see the game well and have an amazing experience. Televised sports necessitate additional lighting optimization for TV broadcasting. To attain these goals, a smart sport lighting design should consider a wide range of quantitative and qualitative lighting parameters. Illuminance in both the horizontal and vertical planes, uniformity of light distribution, lighting artifacts (e.g., flicker and stroboscopic effects), color rendering, color temperature, color contrast, and brightness are all factors that determine the technical side of sports lighting (glare). While the regulation of these various parameters is critical for optimum visibility in sporting venues, the emotional and perceptual components of lighting are as significant.
The art of sports lighting design is considerably more than just meeting technical needs; the psychological impacts of light and visual sensations related to the attractiveness, ambiance, and ambience of the area should also be considered. Lighting should give atmospheric enhancement and even encourage the favorable physiological interaction between light and the human body to amp up the excitement and create an engaging environment.
Every energy-saving opportunity must be pursued
Stadiums and arenas are large-scale facilities built to hold huge crowds and host high-profile athletic events. Aerial sports such as soccer, basketball, football, baseball, and tennis are most commonly played in these venues. Aerial sports are those that include playing with an object that is at least partially above the playing field. High wattage lighting systems are used as the workhorse light engines and distributed at high densities across the wide facility to give the requisite vertical and horizontal illuminance in three-dimensional space. These luminaires have high power requirements (kW) and consume a significant amount of electricity (kWh). Over the service life of a lighting system, energy expenses frequently exceed capital expenditures.
The selection and operation of smart sport lighting systems must take into account energy efficiency and sustainability. To reduce operational costs, comply with ever-changing energy requirements, and qualify for incentives from utilities and energy efficiency rebate programs, every energy-saving potential must be exploited. Energy conservation can be maximized by using efficient luminaires as well as lighting controls that allow luminaires to run only when and at the level required.
Lighting apparatus
A stadium is a big outdoor facility with a tiered structure that partially or entirely surrounds a playing area. An area is a large, enclosed building with a core area surrounded by tiered seating for spectators on most or all sides. These structures are often multipurpose. In addition, they are used for various types of events such as concerts, trade exhibitions, conventions, and corporate gatherings. Aimable floodlights set high around the roof structure or on high masts positioned on the field perimeter illuminate stadiums and other large outdoor sporting venues. Fixed luminaires may be used in smaller locations, such as tennis courts, hockey rinks, and skate parks, if the setbacks are minimal.
Floodlighting systems are also the dominant source of light in arenas, however high bay or low bay lights may be utilized to provide overhead lighting in indoor venues with lower ceiling heights or smaller volumes. Floodlighting is the foundation of sports lighting in general. A flood light is intended to cast a focused beam of light onto a specific region. The light distribution might be symmetric or asymmetric depending on the area to be lighted and the beam control requirements. Aside from precise beam pattern control, the directional light may be equipped with visors or other optical shields to limit high angle light for glare-free lighting.
LED lighting set new standards
LED lighting is at the center of the industry’s recent change. The use of HID lighting, or more particularly, metal halide lamps, has been exceedingly widespread for sports lighting applications, but it has resulted in skyrocketing energy and maintenance expenditures for facility management. Metal halide lighting systems are intrinsically constrained in terms of source efficiency, luminaire efficiency, and the capacity to implement energy-saving lighting management schemes.
LED lighting is now the cutting-edge of lighting technology. Beyond the huge increases in light source efficiency, the technology provides energy-saving options. Additional energy savings can be realized by optimizing all lighting application efficiency (LAE) parameters, including optical delivery efficiency, intensity management, and optimized spectrum. Furthermore, the lifetime of LEDs allows for the development of sports lighting systems that operate nearly maintenance-free for substantially longer periods of time than HID systems.
Along with reduced life cycle costs, an LED system’s capacity to modify the spectral power distribution (SPD) of its emitted light is advantageous. LED devices may output practically any visible light spectrum through dynamic color mixing of numerous LED primaries for color changing lighting. Adding color dynamics to sports lighting increases fan interest and provides unforgettable game experiences. LED lighting technology is also bringing computerized illumination to sporting arenas. LEDs are semiconductor devices that are extremely sensitive to variations in driving current. The degree of electroluminescence produced by electrical impacts in the active region of a semiconductor chip can be changed from 100 percent to 0%. LEDs with this level of controllability can collaborate with electronic circuits that generate digital control logic.
Networking over the internet
The digital aspect of LEDs is used to produce linked, intelligent lighting solutions that provide interoperability, adaptability, and personalizability. The digital networking of LED luminaires, lighting controllers, and distributed and centralized control methods enables the creation of a safe, adaptable, and scalable lighting ecosystem that can be integrated into the IoT infrastructure. LED luminaires in this ecosystem can be individually addressed or managed in conceptual groupings. The introduction of digital control systems eliminates the control zoning constraint that was previously dependent on electrical circuit loading. Implementing zoning and rezoning through software directed at individual luminaires or groups of luminaires leads in increased lighting management flexibility. Multiple control strategies can be deployed to optimize light delivery for aggressive energy savings, ranging from personal tuning, occupancy sensing, time scheduling, daylight harvesting, lumen maintenance dimming, institutional tuning, and demand responses to adaptive compensation, as the same luminaire can be assigned to different control zones under different circumstances.
Individual addressing
Numerous LED luminaires can be coordinated to fine-tune a static color, build visual sequences, or create an infinite mixture of dynamic effects by showing different colors and intensities on multiple luminaires at the same time thanks to individual addressability and digital networking. When addressability is built into LED packages to control individual chips or into LED modules to control individual packages inside an LED luminaire, a dynamic lighting system with spectrum and intensity adjustment capabilities is generated. Its color or correlated color temperature (CCT) tunability allows it to optimize the spectral power distribution (SPD) for the function of the light. This capacity can be utilized to produce elaborate color patterns for sophisticated light shows, increasing the drama and excitement of sports illumination to rival that of the event itself. Tunable white lighting can elicit varied biological responses in humans, resulting in improved player performance and spectator engagement. It also enables the CCT to be calibrated for broadcast cameras. As a result, smart sports lighting is capable of responding to any game or event.
Smart LED sports lights
Luminaires are critical components of the digital lighting network since they not only offer illumination but also function as smart nodes. These independently programmable lighting nodes are linked together to provide for network control and collaborative operations. While using LED luminaires in the context of digital networks expands the capabilities of lighting systems beyond their native features, the collective intelligence of the individual lighting systems in collaboration with the infrastructure provides meaningful insights that can be used to maximize operational efficiency and develop value-added services.
A digitally regulated LED smart sport light combines the light engine with a light controller, providing the intelligence and connectivity needed to make the lighting system smart and interoperable. A system-on-chip (SoC) is a complete processing system that includes a microcontroller, communication interface, and I/O ports. A microcontroller is used to provide programmability to a smart sports lighting system. The code required to consume, store, manage, and translate data into control signals for the LED driver is included on the microcontroller. The LED driver controls LEDs in response to instructions from the light controller (microcontroller) by adjusting the drive current (on/off switching or dimming).
The LED driver in full-featured LED lighting systems must provide accurate, flicker-free dimming for the LEDs to produce the desired luminous intensity. Each LED primary is addressed and muted independently in color tuning systems (RGB, RGBW, RGBA, RGBAW, and so on) and tunable white systems. LED dimming is performed using either pulse-width modulation (PWM) or continuous current reduction (CCR) (CCR). The LED driver is in charge of internal temperature monitoring, junction temperature adjustment, and thermal protection, as well as protecting the light engine from surges and other AC line noise.
Lighting linked
Smart lights must be linked in order to function. A strong network infrastructure is required to build a linked, interoperable environment that fosters synergy. Wired data cable systems can be used to connect sports lighting systems. A DMX/RDM/Ethernet hybrid (e.g., KiNET, ArtNET, and sACN) provides for bidirectional communication between nodes and controllers, as well as simultaneous transmission of numerous DMX universes over a single Ethernet line. transcend DMX’s physical constraints However, wired networked systems have constraints imposed by wiring.
While wired systems’ dependability and high data capacity remain compelling advantages, the trend has advanced toward the usage of wireless mesh networking to establish a flexible, scalable, and interoperable network in a cost-effective manner. A mesh network is distinguished by several, redundant signal channels connecting smart nodes. “Multi-hop” communications allow messages to be carried from the source to the destination. This feature enables the network to retain high dependability while while expanding coverage. Mesh networking based on standard protocols offers a globally interoperable ecosystem of goods that can network and interoperate with each other out-of-the-box, in addition to its unrivaled flexibility and scalability and wire-like reliability. Bluetooth Mesh and ZigBee are two well-known mesh topologies. Both support a large number of interconnections and have a robust product ecosystem. To relay messages, ZigBee employs destination-based routing, whereas Bluetooth Mesh employs managed flood messaging.
The Internet of Things (IoT)
By connecting smart lights to the Internet of Things network via protocol translation gateways, the Internet Protocol (IP) application is extended to these resource-constrained lighting nodes. IoT by definition promises to transform sports lighting. IoT enables collaboration and data exchange between disparate devices over multiple networks. An ecosystem of IoT applications, ranging from cloud computing, Big Data, advanced analytics, and artificial intelligence to machine learning, can be employed by lighting systems to enhance their capabilities. The usage of an IoT platform to arbitrate between the hardware and application layers is an essential component of smart sport lighting. A strong platform will be able to simplify the complicated technological landscape and intelligently coordinate important interactions between various devices, systems, and networks.
Yibai LED Lighting is a reputable manufacturer of LED lighting products. Just feel free to contact us for more information if you have any questions about smart sport lighting projects.
