I'm going to be honest with you: I didn't get this one right the first time.
When I designed the Light Kit for the LEGO® Optimus Prime set (back in the day with the LMB1.0 system), I went all in. Flickering effects, gun effects, pulsing effects, wireless connectors for the interchangeable weapons. Every effect I could think of that felt true to the character, I packed it in. I was genuinely proud of it.
Then Andy tried to install it.
"I packed it full of all those bells and whistles. It was super cool. But because of that, it actually made cabling super difficult. So when I handballed it over to Andy to actually do the user testing, he had a pretty challenging time actually installing those lights."
Andy is the one who sits down with a fresh kit and follows the instructions the way any customer would. His feedback was direct: the install was a nightmare. Too many connections, not enough thought put into what the actual experience of building it would feel like. The design looked great in testing. It just wasn't enjoyable to put together.
That was the moment I had to reconsider what I was actually designing for.
The part that's easy to overlook
There's a version of this job that's purely about chasing the best possible result on the shelf. More effects, more coverage, more fidelity to the source material. That drive is real, and for a set like Optimus Prime it should be. You owe an iconic set everything you've got.
But a kit that looks exactly right once it's installed, yet leaves the builder frustrated getting there, isn't one I'm proud of. The install experience has to feel good on its own terms. Building LEGO® sets is absorbing, satisfying, methodical. The lighting install should feel like a continuation of that, not something else entirely.
"I've really learned when I do lighting design to really focus on the user experience."
Optimus Prime taught me that source material fidelity and a great install aren't in conflict. You don't strip effects back to make things manageable. You design the routing, the cabling, and the instruction sequence around the builder first, then let the effects follow from that structure.
Where every LEGO lighting design process starts
Before any component goes into a kit, the brief starts with the source material. Optimus Prime isn't a generic truck with some lights on it. He's a specific character with a specific presence, specific colours, specific lighting moments that any fan would recognise. Get those wrong, or skip them entirely for the sake of a tidier install, and the kit doesn't do its job.
The question every LEGO lighting design process starts from is: what does this set need to look the way it was always meant to? Not what can we fit in, but what does the set actually call for?
The challenge Optimus Prime set for me was figuring out how to honour that brief while making the build experience something a customer would genuinely enjoy. The answer, once Andy had fed back, was clear. Think harder about the physical logic of the install. Design the instruction sequence around how the LEGO® set is actually built, not around how the lighting layers work internally. Test it with a real person following real instructions, and actually listen to what they find difficult.
"I still pack it full of all the goodies, but I try to make it a really, really fun experience that feels good to install, just like building the LEGO® set itself."
That's the standard now.
What this means in practice
The Optimus Prime story isn't an exception. It's the one I remember most clearly because the feedback was delivered by someone whose job it was to tell me the truth.
Every kit goes through the same tension: how do you give the set what it deserves without making the install something the builder has to problem-solve their way through? The answer is almost never to pull effects out. It's to think harder about how those effects connect together, and to test it with a real person before it goes anywhere near a customer.
That process goes into every kit we make. Not as a formality. Because a kit that misses either side of that brief, source material accuracy or install experience, isn't finished yet.
