Dan Blitzer, NGL Steering Committee, The Practical Lighting Workshop: Products that have been evaluated by the Next Generation Luminaires Design Competition have been vetted to a degree that no other evaluation does. They have been documented by third party testing. And that documentation has been evaluated. And then the products have been evaluated for their lighted performance by a diverse group of professionals from the design, engineering, and construction sides of the business.

Gary Woodall, Gary Steffy Lighting Design Inc.: Being a first-time judge I really wasn't sure what to expect.

Rita Koltai, Koltai Lighting Design, LLC: Well I've heard a lot about it from people who have judged in the past and the organizers of the program. So I knew I was getting myself into a grueling week.

Chris Magee, MGM Resorts International: It's being able to learn, be at the forefront of these next generation luminaires to see what the industry is doing.

Anne Kustner Haser, Anne Kustner Lighting Design, Ltd.: We have people that are lighting designers, manufacturing, some from the utilities.

Rita Koltai: Everyone is looking very carefully at all aspects of the luminaires.

John Delany, Commonwealth Edison: The process is a lot like speed dating. We got very good at picking out the good qualities, the bad qualities.

Craig Bernecker, The Lighting Education Institute: We're actually rating them on a scale of zero to five.

John Delany: And then supply comments as well.

Chris Magee: Knowing that you have x amount of time to go through a couple hundred products, you have to really take a good look at it.

Anne Kustner Haser: Turning it inside out, upside down.

Craig Bernecker: Looking at the photometric performance of luminaires, as well as the lumen maintenance and life testing.

Judging footage: 12 foot candles four feet off.

Chris Magee: You have to measure it. You have to look at color temperature. You have to look at maybe how it works on a wall. Then you have to walk around the product.

Anne Kustner Haser: It's really good to see everybody's critical insights.

Judging footage: You could potentially use it as an ambient light source. You could. You could also use it as a marker.

Anne Kustner Haser: The fact that they require the manufacturers to send two products-- one's mounted in the ceiling or on the wall, but another one is tabletop that we can tear it apart.

Judging footage: This one doesn't have it. No, this is just a dimming controller. That's just the controllers….

Charles Thompson, ARCHILLUME Lighting Design, Inc.: We're going all the way in to see how is it managed and maintained.

Avraham Mor, Lightswitch Architectural: We rip them apart because we have to. You know, it comes back to our responsibility as a specifier.

Craig Bernecker: This afternoon we'll sit down and we will start our deliberations, where we're looking at the composite evaluation of the product. So this is where the judges get to see how the other judges rated the products.

Rita Koltai: It's a helpful touchstone for new innovative products.

Dan Blitzer: The NGL process offers manufacturers visibility. These products are published on the Department of Energy's website. They're published in brochures. They are spoken of in conferences. It's a way to get good products visibility.