EPISODE 10 - JACOB WIMMER

Welcome to the Impulse Spotlight where we meet with product development professionals and shine a light on the products they are most proud of.

In this episode, we dive into the world of optical design learning about the design challenges and complexities of optical systems as well as some of the instruments used in photo labs.

Jacob Wimmer is a seasoned Optical Engineer with a lifelong affinity for lighting. Jacob's journey into the world of optical design began at a young age, spending his summers immersed in his father's optical design business, Charlevoix Design.

Little did he know then, those early experiences would shape the trajectory of his career. After studying architecture at the University of Michigan, Jason drew upon his lighting background to land a position with an architectural lighting design firm in New York City. But the call of home beckoned, and Jacob returned to northern Michigan, where he now co-manages Charlevoix Design alongside his father, Chris.

Beyond his professional pursuits, Jacob finds solace in the great outdoors, where he shares adventures with his wife and two young daughters. An avid hiker, he's tackled over half of the Appalachian Trail. He also enjoys bow hunting for white tail deer in Michigan and for elk when he can make it out to the western states.

Charlevoix Design thrives on diversity, servicing clients across various industries, from illuminated logos to automotive headlights. In our conversation today we uncover how Jacob collaborates with clients to overcome challenges in material definition and system integration and hear about Jacob's experience revolutionizing  snowblower lighting.  Join us as we dive into the illuminating world of optical design.

Show Notes:

Click here to learn more about Charlevoix Design.

Podcast Transcript:

Hey, Jacob, welcome to the show.

Hi, Troy. Thanks for having me.

Sure, sure.

So I started Impulse over 25 years ago, worked for a company that had like all facets of product development under 1 roof saw that they were not in it for the long haul and we kind of started impulse to help companies design products and, you know, get them developed and and manufactured . So how did your company get started?

Sure. So actually we are a family company. My father started Charley design in the mid 19 80 s. He would worked for a few other larger companies doing optical design work for automotive, both exterior and interior, and then another company doing injection molding of lenses and reflectors, vacuum metallizing of reflectors for street lighting and more General type applications like architecture, architectural fixtures, things like that, and so he eventually just wanted to go out on his own and return to his hometown in northern Michigan, and so he started his own optical design service.

Very interesting. So obviously you provide optical design services walk, walk us through what that entails a little bit like, you know, typically the question is, what services do you provide? So kind of expand on optical design of what that means.

Sure. So our kind of slogan is we provide full service optical design kind of an informal slogan. But what we mean by that is we try to we are here to kind of assist our customers from early stages of product development , from initial concepts, you know, we can help them develop concepts and do feasibility studies and then you know, we are going to help them progress through the design. And take it to, you know, final production, in which case we can be there to help measure, you know, we have got a photo lab and can help measure parts and then kind of some of the main services that fall under kind of occur during the entire process. Excuse me, so optical design, when we say optical design, we are talking about THREED defining in THREED CAD lenses, reflectors, light pipes, light guides, and other optical components . So you know, 1 of our big deliverables is we are going to give you 3D CAD data that says, you know, this is this is what your your reflector needs to be, and then you are going to take that incorporate it into a mechanical design. And and and then actually very importantly, we always ask for once our surface data is incorporated , we want it back to do a final check simulation and I will explain simulation in a second. And and so that is that is kind of the big thing and then, you know, along the way, we are generating reports and showing giving providing status updates on, you know, this is our prediction for the actual photometric output, what the light is going to do in your product. And so along with that goes optical simulation that is always virtually always a part of optical design. I say virtually it is always a part of it, it. So we are when I say optical simulation, we are talking forward ray tracing. So there are like most like for instance, LED manufacturers will characterize their sources, so each LED gets characterized , it gets measured, and they generate ray files, these are very precise sets of data that tell you where light is coming from and where it is going. And it is it is very helpful to have these accurate, measured files and you know, we can download these from LED manufacturers websites, put them in our software, and then we can start build building optical systems in THREED and assigning them materials. I mean, basically we are just loading in components and assigning them appropriate materials, and then we are running a simulation, in which case, sensors that we set up will detect how the light moves through the system and give us, you know, an output that we can understand and understand it against whatever the target specification is.

Okay. And when you say material, is that like the it is not the light material, it is the material that it is reflecting off of?

Right. So, you know, for instance, a reflector typically talking about vacuum metal plastic components . So, you know, there is no that is just how reflectors are off, often manufactured . You know, the aluminum papers deposited on plastic component and we will for instance, we will say just based on our experience. You know, we would say we are going to run 85 % specular reflectivity, specular meaning, you know, it is like a mirror, you know, as opposed to a very diffuse type of reflection and 85 % of the light that hits that surface is going to be reflected.

Okay, all right, so when you say optical design or that you guys design lighting, you are actually not designing the lights, you are designing the reflector that.

We are designing the reflectors, the lenses, you know, those types of things, so typically we are working with electrical engineers and, you know, mechanical designers and other people that are developing, you know, how a product comes together. You know, e.g., might be a flashlight, you know, so I mean, we have done flashlights or, you know, headlights talking about the things that go on your on your head and so there is there is definitely another team of people but, you know, we are kind of the experts when it comes to here is how, you know, if you have 1, I mean, first of all, we can help you understand, you know, if you are somebody that says, I want to develop a flashlight, but I do not know, you know, what is a good flashlight, what is an appropriate beam pattern? What is a lumen you know, what is what is Candela? You know, I want to be able to see a certain distance so we can help you say, okay, well, if you want to see a certain distance. And and we can even test other products on the market in our photo lab and show you what they do and then we can help kind of quantify, you know, or build an objective system of measuring that light and that outcome so that we can build and simulate something that is going to meet the desired outcome.

Okay, yeah, you mentioned the photo lab. What are you what are you actually measuring, are you actually measuring like the light output or explain that?

Yeah, that is that is a good question that actually gets into kind of the next service that can be a standalone service as well. So we have a variety of different instruments . 1 of the things we have is a it is called a type A goniometer and what it is is it is a really large piece of equipment, I do not know, it is probably 10 ft wide, 7 ft tall and you there is 2 axes, there is 2 servo motors, and you mount something like an automotive head lamp or a tail lamp. In the center of it. And based on those servo motors, you can turn that lamp in any direction, a 100 ft away from that lamp is a photo cell that is measuring intensity, it is measuring light coming off of that lamp. That only the intensity in a single direction, so if you are talking about zero degrees horizontal, zero degrees of vertical, basically straight out from the lamp, you know, you will measure just a small area because you are a 100 ft away, so but then we can rotate, you know.

5 degrees, right and measure what is coming off that way. So that is that is a really helpful piece of equipment to have very few people have a facility with, you know, a 100 ft test tunnel unless you are manufacturing . These kind of lamps and it is it is often used for automotive, but it is very helpful in other applications as well. So that is that is kind of the big piece of equipment, and then we have a small integrating sphere, which if we can use this to measure. Lumens coming out of an LED. So oftentimes people, you know, will measure a part and people say, well, it is not bright enough, it is not meaning specification , well, let us dismantle it and let us actually measure the LED lumens off of. You know, you are off of your LED and see if that is matching the simulation assumptions and, you know, oftentimes we will find out that it is being under driven or whatever, so we can also measure color temperature , we can measure the color of Leds, which is defined in something called the C e color space there is depending on what you are doing in lighting, that can be very critical and we can also measure luminance, we have a luminance camera, which is it is like a it is a way of measuring perceived brightness, so in the UN is candela squared.

And so it is it is like a gun, it is like aiming a scope at something like maybe it is a lit logo and you want to understand how bright is this thing relative to, you know, any other brightness and and so that is that luminance meter will tell you.

Okay, very interesting. Wow, I had a question and it just lost it. Earlier you talked about 85 % reflectivity, is that right?

Yes.

Is that kind of the max or if not, why do not you go to 100 and explain that?

Sure. So and that was just kind of an e.g. of a, you know, a definition that we would actually apply to a surface there. There can be variance. I mean, that is just kind of a very typical reflectivity that we see. Using vacuum metallizing, which is very efficient now there is other code coatings and things like that that can be applied that can increase reflectivity. And so sometimes our customers that are very intimately familiar with these things will you know, they will they will actually specify well, actually we are going to use 87 % reflectivity or it very, very rarely goes higher but it is it is critical to know these things because we have I mean, we have had situations where, you know, maybe it is an unknown and then somebody comes back and makes a part a prototype or even a final part and they it is a chrome part and they assume that Chrome is going to be as reflective as vacuum metal organization. And I am going to kind of throw a number out, but I think it is around 50 % reflective instead of 85 and massive difference.

Sure. That is interesting. The you you were talking about the measurement tool that is got the 10 ft by 7 ft and then 100 ft run. What was that called again?

Goniometer.

Yeah, okay, so when you are measuring that, is it you are only measuring like 1 direction or does it kind of give you a for lack of a better term like a spectrum of like in the middle, the light is shining at this intensity and out here it is at this intensity kind of gives you a map, so to speak, of what the light is doing.

Yeah, so it is only going to measure 1 moment in time, but like I referred to, there is 2 axes, 2 servo motors, so we will we can program it to do is to scan an area like let us say you want to understand. Let us say it is a flashlight, and you know that your beam pattern is within + or -30 degrees horizontal and + or -30 degrees vertical, we can do a scan and we can take a measurement every for instance, quarter of a degree. And so we will get this data back and we are going to have a measurement every quarter degree in 2 directions, and what we can do with this data in our software is really cool, we can actually take this data and generate what is called an i s file, which is I mean, it is basically a file that contains this data, but we can but there is software that can project this data onto a surface so we can take measured data and simulate with it so if you wanted to understand.

You know, we have measured in candela in intensity, but you we want to understand what is going to fall on a ground plane, which would the measurement would be in lucks or lums per meter squared, so we can we can take the this measured data and project it and accurately get, you know what you would expect on your target plane in simulation software?

Very interesting. So impulse works with like inventors, individuals, small design teams, medium, you know, large design teams. What kind of what is your typical client look like?

Sure. And so I guess we do not I would not say we have a typical client necessarily, but I mean, our kind of bread and butter is automotive, both exterior and interior and you know on 1 side of the spectrum, there is customers that. You know, they are very experienced , very large, large companies that might manufacture , say, a tail lamp for a vehicle, and they may have a team of 1020 or more optical engineers. But perhaps at a moment in time, they are they are just too busy and they they need to outsource some of their their optics. So we are we are kind of we serve as that buffer at times. That is that is 1 scenario, but then we also work with, I would say small and small to large companies that are maybe they are developing their first lighting product, maybe they are, you know, we have worked with agricultural company or actually better e.g. would be like lawn and garden, so somebody that is developing a lawn and garden product or that is what they do, but they want to incorporate a light into their product for the first time or they want to, you know, greatly improve the lighting that exists on their product. So, you know, that is a customer that is like less well versed and lighting usually. And so, you know, there is more kind of education that needs to happen and, you know, more conversation which we love and encourage. So, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, that is cool. So what is it about the way you guys do business that attracts your clients to come back again and again and again?

Yeah. So, you know, I I started I mean, I actually worked in high school during summers at Charlo Void Design measuring in our photo lab and I continued to work summers through college and I had the opportunity to attend. A user group meeting for our primary software, it is very specialized software and, you know, I go into this room of people and, you know, there is probably 20 people or so it is not huge and everybody's got a name tag. It says where they are from and I knew no 1. But, you know, we are we are a small company in Northern Michigan and I had multiple people come up to me afterwards and say, you are they recognized the Charley design and they recognized my last name from working with my father and and I had people that say, you know, you you know, your your dad really, you know, we have worked with him a long time. He is helped us out of these tough spots, you know, we really enjoyed working with him and I mean, that that made an impression on me, right? And I I think what we try to do is I mean, of course we try to be experts and we have, you know, We have, you know, it is getting close to 40 years that Charley design has been around, so we have a lot of experience and, you know, we we just really try to emphasize the service people and, you know, do what we can to help people and whatever their goals are.

Sure, sure. So I always like this question because everybody sees the product development world kind of from a different angle. You know, you have got your niche obviously. So what do you see as the biggest challenges facing product development professionals?

Yeah, it is. I mean, I think this depends on the customer quite a bit. I know in the automotive world and probably other industries as well. Everybody wants a very, very quick turnaround and and they want a very high quality of service at a quick turnaround. So that is 1 challenge and you know, we could not do what we do without software that greatly speeds up the process. And then for those that are new to lighting, it is you know, which is that we have a decent amount of customers that are new to lighting and they do not know where to start. And so then how do you you know, 1 of our objectives becomes to kind of coach these people through and, you know, we need to ask questions and understand, okay, well, what are your goals for this product, you know, let us say you have a product that you want some kind of indicator light, but it needs to be, you know, you want to look like something more than just this tiny little glowing spec, you want it to be a lit emblem, let us say your logo lights up, so you know, how do we define how bright it is, you know, like what environment are we going to view it in?

Is it going to be under sunlight or is it in dark room and and what kind of luminance value should it it have and then and then how do we go from, you know, okay, we have now defined an objective outcome to where do we start with with LED lumens you know, and so, you know, we kind of need to walk people through that process, which is usually all part of a early stage concept and feasibility study.

That is interesting. So, can you give us like I guess a success story kind of an e.g. of, you know, somebody used your service and I do not know you overcame a big challenge or, you know, something where you help achieve a successful outcome.

Sure. And I mean, there is a variety of things that come to mind. I mean, certainly automotive lamps are some of the more complex automotive exterior lamps are some of the more complex ones. But oftentimes like I walk away, you know, from a project feeling good if we were able to kind of overcome. A a big I mean, timing is always a huge issue there. So if we can do a good job with that, I appreciate those projects, but I think some of the more interesting ones to talk about are or at least for me. I we had the opportunity and we would wanted this opportunity for a long time. We live in Northern Michigan. We snow blow right, we are clearing snow in the winter and we are oftentimes doing that in the dark and I have a will not say the name of it, but a big orange snowblower that does a great job, but its light is kind of abysmal, it is a you know, it is it is got a it is got a bulb, it is got an incandescent bulb and a reflector, I will say reflector with air quotes because it does not it does not focus the light, it is not designed, there is no optical design to it and so I end up wearing a head lamp a light on my head. And we were approached by a company, a different company to develop 2 snowblower lights and it really is a pretty simple design. But what was neat about it was we brought tir total internal reflection type optics. It is a lens, basically a clear material. That uses internal reflection and refraction to collect. They are extremely efficient optics and there is different ways of there is different configurations for them, but we did something where we focused the light vertically. Which, you know, helped get a really nice hot spot, but then we allowed the light to more naturally spread horizontally so you could see kind of 180 degrees around the snowblower, you know, in front of you, so very controlled vertically but spread out horizontally and like I said, a fairly simple design for us, but at the end of the day, I mean, the customer came back with the before and after pictures, you know, just their old product and their new product and their facility. I mean, it was literally night and day and mean, it was like, wow, this is this is the the light I want to be using at 5AM in the morning when I am clearing snow.

Right.

Another quick examples.

Yeah.

We both my father and I are runners and we had somebody come. They wanted us to do a light that you wore on your head that was specifically kind of marketed towards runners and we got to go we kind of went above and beyond, put some extra time into it. We we did some product testing, we tested things in our lab, but then we also went for runs, we would go outside and run down a path and and, you know, kind of talk to each other about what we like did not like about lights and different lights. And then we actually pulled some other runners and we ended up coming with coming up with a fairly unique pattern that put a you know, we focus most of the light in a very tight beam so you could see far. But then we also had a kind of a near field light. That we drove down a little bit more so you could see better right in front of you, which gave you this overall sense of security and you need to have the right kind of proportion of, you know, light down range to light in front of you. So you do not if you have too much light in front of you. You. You do not feel like you can see as far. So that was another instance where I think that was a, you know, had a really good outcome and was kind of near and dear to our hearts.

Yeah, yeah, that is really interesting. So when you talked about I did not realize you could do this. You talked about, you know, sending the beam far and then sending 1 down is that all 1 light and then the reflectors just designed to do that.

Yes, it is all 1 light. That 1 is actually a T R design as well. So again, it is it is a 1 it is 1 moulded plastic component, acrylic, clear acrylic and you know, we are shaping I mean, there is different ways of doing it, but you know, we are shaping the reflector Reflective and refractive surfaces to I mean, you really you are you are shaping them to create a beam pattern, the the beam pattern you want and I mean a lot of times what we will end up doing is if we are working with something that we know is going to be tight a tight beam pattern, but then we want some degree of controller will collimate the light at first, so we will we will focus as much light as we can into a very, very tight beam pattern and then we will add some kind of optics like pillow optics, they are called on the A side that ****** that take this light that is coming out more or less parallel and. And then they are adding spread, you know, maybe you want 25 + or -25 degrees spread horizontal, but only 5 degrees vertical, so we can kind of define different surfaces to to do that.

Very interesting, so you are designing picking up now you are designing the reflector to do 1 thing and then the lens does another thing.

That that is often a tactic, yeah.

Interesting, very cool. I wanted to go back to the snowblower e.g., did orange snowblower company get a light a better light after they saw the other companies light?

We have so I have not had a chance to test it but they have they do have actually I think a pretty similar light now, although I have seen it in the, you know, the local big box stores and I have wondered about the optical clarity of the material they are using. So I would be really curious to to test it myself.

Yeah, yeah, cool. So at impulse we do everything we can to, you know, make it super simple for somebody to start working with us. What is the process look like for somebody to start working with Charlevoix?

Yeah. I mean, the process I mean, it always starts with a conversation and the best way to start that is go to our website, charlevoixdesign.com and we have a contact form you can fill out and we will get back to you very quickly. Cool. And then after that conversation , you know, the initial conversation , is it just quote po go like or is there any other stuff that has to happen before that? Yeah. So, I mean, usually we will, you know, do some kind of introduction conversation and then, you know, usually we are going to ask that you share THREED CAD share any specifications you have, you know, whether that is hey, we have a really good idea of, you know, the type of, you know, the beam pattern we need to create or, you know, it is a i keep using the logo e.g., but, you know, hey, it is a little logo and you know, we need to be x candela per meter squared, so sometimes those things are very well defined up front, sometimes they are not color color, there might be color specifications . And then, you know, if Leds are already selected, which oftentimes they are, but, you know, we can certainly help select Leds as well, so and then, you know, some kind of bomb bill materials. So we understand, you know, what what all the components are and how we can define them in our simulation software. So once we have we will collect as much information as we can and provide a quote.

Yeah, interesting. I have been meaning to ask this question the whole time because you keep mentioning Leds. Is it pretty much 100 % Leds now or do you still do some incandescent stuff?

You know, it I want to say it is, but I think it was maybe a year now, maybe a little longer now I was working. It is working on a tail light. I mean, you know, if you see many different cars on the road today. There is, you know, like let us say it is a truck. There might be a base level version with all halogen incandescent bulbs and then there is the high level version that is all LED. And so I have I have worked on a base level tail lamp not too long. Ago that used all incandescent .

Okay. Yeah, I drive old cars. So are all the lights LED now? Are they still Hagen sometimes?

Oh, they are they are still halogen. I mean, I am driving. What to me is a pretty new vehicle and it is only it is 4 years old and I have got halogen headlamps.

Interesting. So what is the biggest challenge your business has seen over the years?

You know, I guess we have seen like I said, our bread and butter is automotive and for exterior, automotive especially, I mean, the the players out there, the manufacturers of, you know, headlights and tail lights and other other products used to. They they are having more and more they have larger teams of people that are working on them so they might have, you know, 20 optical engineers or 10 optical engineers as opposed to, you know, it used to be they had a handful, you know, 2345. And I mean, there is a lot so there is a lot of demand out there for this type of work. But as you know, some of our big customers have gotten bigger and grown their own resources is, you know, they are they are less and less likely to need to outsource this. And then on top of that, they Are there is, you know, there are competitors that are overseas and as you can expect, they are they are probably going to be cheaper.

Sure.

Yeah, we we see that that too that thankfully there is the time difference, the cultural difference, the language different, you know, that that it is still seems to be still more efficient to use us even though, yeah, we are more expensive than than some of the services you can get overseas, so.

Absolutely. I mean, that certainly helps out us out and then just the experience we have, I mean, you know, the 40 years of experience helps.

Yeah. Right. Yeah, speaking of experience, and maybe we should ask your dad, but what is the biggest change that is happened over the the life of the business?

Oh, man, that biggest changes over the life of the business. I mean, I know he talks a lot about industry changes that I really have not seen. I mean, Leds have been huge obviously. And then with that, I think, you know, people are incorporating some kind of lighting into products more and more and more, you know, I mean, even just look at automotive as an e.g. and if you look at newer vehicles, I mean, usually usually higher end vehicles, but now, not not always, you know, there is all kinds of things that light up in cars now and it is just I mean, it is it is it is good for our business, you know, and then consumer goods too that, you know, people want to incorporate lighting more and more often.

Sure. Yeah, when you were talking about headlight and tail designs, it seems like, you know, I do not know but it just seems like they have become so much more complex than, you know, 20, 40 years ago.

Oh, absolutely. And and something that goes hand in hand with that is iterations. So, you know, 1 of the great things about what we can do is I mean, our the the software we use is highly specialized. It is very it is very accurate if you put the right you know, if you build it the right way, do the right things that can be extremely accurate and it is also you can do things very quickly the but it used to be, you know, there is when you were given a tail lamp, let us say everything was kind of defined and you were only expected to go through. You know, 1 or 2 iterations and now it is, you know, we are looking for perfect homogeneous lid appearance and balancing costs and and it needs to be absolutely perfect, you know. I mean, we got to get the look right, we got to optimize wherever we can and and that is good. But actually and in addition to that, there is just design changes, there is constant changes that happen throughout. Some of these, you know, product development life cycles. And so we will just iterate and iterate and iterate and iterate. We are just always being asked to do that. And so we are constantly on our feet and looking I mean just constant changes.

Sure. Yeah, that is interesting. So kind of as we start to wrap up and shift gears just a little bit, but what are some of the and you kind of touched on this, but what are some of the emerging trends you are kind of seeing in your corner of the product development world?

Sure. So 1 of the big things is homogeneous lid appearance. I mean, you know, when you and you can see this in automotive and you can see it in other products, but, you know, when Leds first came on the scene, you notice it, you could kind of see the individual Leds, but now people want to see what, you know, an industrial designer will say, Okay, I want to I want a certain shape, it is a sea shape or or whatever it is, or just a line of light. I do not want to see the fact that there is individual Leds and and that can. I mean, that has its own challenges with it, for sure, because you now have to diffuse the light to hide the fact that there is Leds and there is so many different ways of doing it, but 1 of the common ways, especially for more like consumer goods or interior automotive, is translucent materials and Translucent materials are they it is gotten better and better, but it is been hard to come by accurate definitions that we can use in simulation software because you have to you basically have to measure how light scatters through that material. And you have to understand how light is also absorbed through the material, so you can understand, okay, you know, if I have a 10 degree beam going in depending on the thickness of the material, it could be a 2030 degree, 60 degree beam coming out. And 50 % of the light is going through. So that is that is been a challenge, but it is it is gotten better. Our access to material definitions has definitely improved in recent years.

Yeah, interesting. You mentioned homogeneous with lit appearance. So that is basically you want the entire lens or light or whatever to look the same.

Yeah, to something needs to glow evenly, you know. So, you it does not look like there is hot spots and dark spots in it, you know, that are kind of off putting to the eye, I suppose.

Yeah, yeah, in your experience, what are some of the most underutilized tools that that you guys offer?

Underutilized tools. I think I think I am I would think about that in terms of a service that, you know, anyone looking to jump into lighting for the first time should consider and that is, you know, we would really like you to engage us. Early on in a project and consider doing a concept and feasibility study, you know you will learn a lot going through a feasibility study. It is it is extremely helpful if you are new to lighting. And, you know, so oftentimes we get engaged later on when, you know, there is already a space claim for this optical system without it really having been understood and there is already a bomb and, you know, and somebody has knows they know exactly what they want. From a light output standpoint, but they and they have kind of defined some some parts and pieces to get them there but not well enough and now they have designed enough of the product that it is in a space where you can not possibly get what they are looking for and we can I mean, if you engage us early on, there is really very quick studies we can do. I mean, sometimes it is a couple days, some day times it is only a day or less to figure out. You know, and just have a conversation . I mean, sometimes we will just know, Hey, this is this is not going to work, it is and it is not going to work because of physics and we can we can help show you that. So, you know, the more you can the earlier you can engage us, the better.

Yeah. So in the feasibility study, you are not just saying this will not work. You are you are also saying to accomplish what you want to accomplish, we need this much space or this much depth or, you know, whatever it might be.

Right. I mean, a lot of times we can help guide people early on it. And honestly, there is times where we will get through a concept or a concept study, a feasibility stage. And if it is a simple part, sometimes, you know, 50 to 80 % of the work is already done. You know, so it you know, maybe you only need a couple more days and a final check simulation to to finish the process.

Interesting. So I do not know if this question will apply, I will be interested. How do you see the role of AI impacting the development process in your world?

Yeah, I I am not sure there is. I mean, I do not see it having a like currently, I do not see anything out there that is going to have significant impact, but that could change quickly. We do have there are optimization tools that are built into some of the software packages that optical engineers use illumination optical engineers that are there to help you try to get to a good result without having to do much of your own leg work. And I honestly am not super experienced with them but from but from what I have seen, oftentimes, you know, they are they are just guessing and they are changing variables that you have to set up anyway. And, you know, you are better off just using experience to, you know, define a system up front and go through a couple iteration and somebody experienced that this is going to generally be able to get to a better result just as quick or quicker.

Yeah, yeah. So last question, anything else you want to mention or talk about before we wrap up?

Sure you know the optics are are very sensitive. I mean, what we do it is not rocket science, but it is, you know, it can be these systems can be very sensitive and more than what some people in product development are used to like, you know, we in terms of lED tolerant positional tolerance of + or - a half a millimeter in every direction and that is, you know, that is pretty tight to some people. And in certain applications we have got to be tighter than that. That is not to say every application requires that kind of tolerance, but some do. And when I you know, I mentioned needing an appropriate space to work within and the larger an optical system is, the more forgiving it is, it is just a product of focal distance and so, you know, there is. I mean, like I say, these systems can be very sensitive and so I would suggest to people that are looking to develop these, you know, try to understand the system and do not do not make assumptions . When I say that there is there is other variables, there is mounting features, if you are talking about mounting features on a light pipe, they can just sap light out of a system. And create light leaks and hot spots that if we do not account for those in simulation, which we can, you know, there is going to be issues, so we try to we try to circumvent those, we try to understand as much of the design as we can up front. And, you know, we will account for that in simulation, you know, but there is just instances where things change later on and you need to you need to keep your optical engineer up to date with those, so I mean. We can see people change out Leds and, you know, they do not tell you right away. Well, it can be a huge difference. So just just be aware in working with optical illumination systems that any any small change material changes, they all make a difference. So just be aware of that and make sure you are having open conversations . With your optical engineer and keeping them abreast of everything that is going on and do do check traces, you know what, before final parts go out for tooling, like deliver that cat to your optical engineer, have them do a final check trace because. Almost always you will find you will find something, you know, there are small changes and you will find something and it is better to know about them up front.

Sure, so this has been great. Uh, where where can we learn more about your company?

Charlevoixdesign.com. And that is a little bit of a hard spelling. It is Charlevoix design, all 1 word com, like I said, just reach out to us via via contact submission and we will respond quickly.

Awesome. Yeah, I will get that in the show notes and they can just click on the link down below and will not even have to spell it.

Yep, or, you know, reach out to me on Linkedin. That is another good way.

All right, awesome. This has been great. I really appreciate you doing this, Jacob.

Yeah, thank you, Troy. It is been fun.