The Lightpipe Tutorial will introduce many of the capabilities within FRED relevant to illumination systems. Links are provided to the relevant Help pages as various topics are presented.

The tutorial is divided into three sections:

Basic - where users will 1) construct geometry by building a simple slab lightpipe, 2) create a rudimentary LED source, 3) perform basic raytracing, 4) invoke analysis tools such as Ray Summary, Irradiance, and Intensity on a Polar Grid.

Intermediate - Complexity is increased by 1) modifying the simplistic LED source based upon information from a vendor data sheet, 2) calculating the photometric quantity Illuminance at the lightpipe exit face, 3) introducing FRED's gluing option to apply a prism to the lightpipe exit face which re-directs light exiting the lightpipe, and 4) analyzing ray data using ray path and history features.

Advanced -  Advanced concepts and techniques are introduced including 1) replacing the prior sources with a vendor rayset, 2) importing and positioning CAD geometry of the LED packaging, 3) modifying lightpipe geometry to maximize coupling into the lightpipe using principles of trimming. optimizing prism angle based upon a user-defined merit function [FRED Optimum version only].