Seven months in an office makes a difference. Not in a good, bad or an ugly way. There’s things you learn, there’s things you remember and there’s things you change your mind about.
I’ve been an intern in LichtVision from February already (yes, that’s where my summer went, poof!). It’s an internationally active light design office in Berlin, Germany with both interior and exterior, private and public, hospitality, retail and office projects around the world. During my stay here, the main sites have been in Abu Dhabi, St.Petersburg, Mumbai, Berlin, Wolfsburg, Miami etc.
So, what has happened during these seven months:
- I can use Photoshop now by means of creating images. I mean really use. Anyone can tune their family photos and copy-paste some google imagery into compositions. But to create a usable .psd file with functional layering, changeable gradients and sensible masking – that’s another thing. Do YOU know what paths are good for?
- AutoCAD. It actually works. It’s not only for making your plans easy to read. It’s also irreplaceable for geometrical creativity – you move stuff around until it fits – and you can be sure that it’s correct by the millimetre. In architecture you must be precise. You really need to plan the 5 cm for the transformer. When it’s settled, you cannot move the fixture anymore. It’s going to be there. Permanently. And there’s no better way to be sure of your dimensions than draw it 1:1 and be convinced.
- DiaLUX is a miracle, too. It’s free and functional. A good thing, anyhow. In theatre, you try out a fixture and if it’s not good, you add another one or dim the light. If you’re experienced, you can guess by the wattage, whether it will be enough or not. And if you really need to be sure, you take a WYSIWYG program for precise calculation. Like DiaLUX. For me, it’s been a gate to the world of lux and lumens. Yes, we studied some physics at school and had a picture of a sphere around a light source. But what it actually means – is 6000lm a lot or a little? How does a human eye perceive the relationship of 50 and 150 lux in comparison to 2000 and 2500? The physical and physicological aspects of light are more important (and interesting) than I thought. The difference between different light sources – the colour rendering index and different size markings of fluorescents, the IP ratings of lighting fixtures, how DALI works, the different voltages in Europe and U.S…. It’s just great. I want a spectroscope for Christmas.
- The market situation in lighting. It’s grand, it’s clever, it’s competitive. There are hundreds and hundreds of companies making lighting fixtures. Most of them produce ugly crystal chandeliers and cheap indoor pendants like the ones sold in supermarkets. There are a number of design companies whose fixtures are each a piece of art for specific design surroundings. There are some producers that offer practical lighting, covering all the basic needs for downlights, pendants, wall lamps and exterior fixtures with a secure and modern design aspect. And there are the companies that specialize in a certain innovation like high-power LED-s or extra-long fluorescents. I made a list of all the companies I’ve stumbled upon during my internship. It’s 13 pages in Excel with a font size 10. Most of them I would never recommend to anyone. But most of the companies you contact will be desperate to get their products into your project. And then there are the posh ones who you will have to torture to get a fair-sized .jpg image to present to the client.
- It’s amazingly important, HOW you present your stuff. I knew it before and I find more proof of it on my way. People don’t see the images inside your head, so you will have to draw them out nice and clear. Instead of saying, we’ll have a backlight on this counter here, you’ll spend two days on finding imagery of similar projects and on photoshopping a hand-drawn scetch into something even remotely realistic-looking. Knowing how to use InDesign is good, a nice compact .pdf is a lot better than a folder of different-sized jpg-s of altering resolution.
I think I won’t be taking up any more internships in the near future. Firstly, I don’t like 9-5 office work, second, I hate to be micromanaged. And as an intern, you get micromanaged.
The hardest part was the language barrier. Okay, I had the german vocabulary for buying cheese in a supermarket. But you don’t discuss the transparency factors of lightshade fabrics in cheese-buying terms. It took me about four months plus german lessons to switch from bad English to worse German at work. Now, by the end of the internship, I’m able to make phone calls to german companies, asking for (and understanding the replied) information and have learned to spell my e-mail address in a way it’s gotten right. I think it’s a big thing.
Another evil thing to struggle with at an internship is the project management. In a busy office, everyone has their thing to do. The intern is supposed to be of great help to everyone, but it’s often up to yourself to step up to people and demand for work. It’s hard as they, of course, have their deadlines and stuff and don’t really feel like explaining a new task to the stupid intern. So there have been many days passing simply waiting for work to appear. Of course, it’s a matter of coordination and scheduling and I understand that LV just wasn’t ready for a theatre student with no language command. I don’t blame it for that. It could have been a lot more intensive, it could have been much more boring. This is the way it went. There have been some enjoyable moments when I’ve had several tasks at the same time and could plan my days reasonably. But mostly, it’s a small task to do, then waiting, then little (or big) corrections to the task, then waiting again. On days with good self-motivation, the meanwhile time is good to read catalogues and absorb the information. On worse days, it’s just useless time being bored and surfing the net.
The language barrier is the main culprit here, too. Good work is a lot about communication (active, intensive, fluent communication). When you need to get a grip of yourself every time you want to say something, it’s hard. And when you feel like you still didn’t get the whole point but she’s explained it three times already so rather just nod and say okay, I’ll try to improvise something you maybe might mean. When you need to be specially addressed in another language for mutual understanding, there’s a lot of things that go past your ears. You don’t overhear the wiseness of your colleagues, you misinterpret their English. You can translate a german sentence with a dictionary, but how do you interpret a sentence with apparently incoherent english words if it just doesn’t ring a bell?
I’m not saying you shouldn’t take up exchanges abroad. On the contrary. It widens your world and you learn a lot more than you would at home. I’m just saying it’s different from taking up a job in a familiar surroundings. When I got here, I had to start from blank. What I already knew, didn’t make a difference because I couldn’t express myself. In a way it’s a thrill to go back to zero. You cannot cling to the standards and limits you had before. You need to agree to the methods that are used and do things in a way you’d never do yourself. And there’s a lot you learn while doing this.
P.S. it seems that the people in the LV office appear to have no personal life whatsoever. At 9 am when I come to work, they’re already there. When I give up waiting or working at 6 or 7, they stay there. Some actually go for lunch breaks, some eat a sandwich by the computer. I think they’re paid well for overtime. Not me. I’m going home when I need to.
