Light source modeling for automotive lighting devices

Automotive lighting devices generally have to meet high standards. For example to avoid discomfort glare for the oncoming traffic, luminous intensities of a low beam headlight must decrease by more than one order of magnitude within a fraction of a degree along the horizontal cutoff-line. At the same time, a comfortable homogeneous illumination of the road requires slowly varying luminous intensities below the cutoff line. All this has to be realized taking into account both, the legal requirements and the customer's stylistic specifications. In order to be able to simulate and optimize devices with a good optical performance different light source models are required. In the early stage of e.g. reflector development simple unstructured models allow a very fast development of the reflectors shape. On the other hand the final simulation of a complex headlamp or signal light requires a sophisticated model of the spectral luminance. In addition to theoretical models based on the light source's geometry, measured luminance data can also be used in the simulation and optimization process.