fyrstormer
Banned
I don't think there's anything to be gained by rationalizing personal preferences using sciencey-sounding explanations. People prefer light that allows them to see clearly, suits their mood and the task at-hand, and doesn't give them a headache. There is no way to quantify personal preference.
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Almost all of my home lighting has been LED for the past 8 years. A couple years ago I replaced all of my 2700K Philips LED bulbs with newer Sylvania LED bulbs in two different tints: 2700K and 3500K. I put the 3500K bulbs in places where I want to remain alert, such as my study and our living room, and I put the 2700K bulbs in places where I want to relax, such as the bedrooms. In the bathrooms I use a mixture of 3500K LED (for power savings) and halogen bulbs (for full-spectrum lighting). That way my girlfriend can put on her makeup (on the rare occasion she does so) with a good idea of what it will look like when we go out for the evening (assuming we make it that far).
I use a program on my computers called F.Lux to adjust the apparent color temperature of the screens from 6500K during the day to 4300K at night. I tried ~4500K lightbulbs at one point but I found them to be too stark for home lighting at night, though strangely the same tint works great for the large fluorescent bulbs in my kitchen. However, I prefer at least 4500K, all the way up to 6500K, for spotlighting objects with my flashlights at night; for whatever reason, I can discern colors more clearly at a distance, at night, with neutral-to-cool tinted light than I can with warm-tinted light. (calling 6500K "cool tint" is a bit of a misnomer, since it's the color of the sun itself, but it's definitely "cool tint" compared to old-fashioned incandescent heatbulbs.)
However, there is one caveat I've noticed: I bought two Makai flashlights recently, one with a cool-white Cree XM-L and the other with a neutral-warm-white Cree XP-L, and in some cases I can actually see better with the warmer-tinted XP-L. I think this is because the Makai is a thrower, so it's most useful for illuminating objects at a much longer distance than I normally do, and over such a long distance the brighter atmospheric backscatter from the cooler-tinted XM-L becomes a problem. (this is not a sciencey-sounding explanation like I mentioned above; I actually observed the additional backscatter in side-by-side tests.) Basically it's the same reason why automotive foglights are supposed to be yellow. However, it's only a minor nitpick, because within the brightest part of the hotspot I can still see more detail using the cooler-tinted XM-L. The corona and spill are more glaring than they are with the warmer-tinted XP-L, but let's be honest, with any thrower you're going to be paying attention to the objects in the brightest part of the hotspot anyway, because the corona doesn't reach very far, and the spill doesn't reach at all.
In general, it's been my observation that deviating from one's preferred tint is less problematic when the light is brighter overall. I think this is why the 4500K fluorescent bulbs in my kitchen don't bother me while the dimmer lighting in the rest of my house looked stark and depressing at the same tint. I think this is because brighter light ensures your retinas get an adequate amount of light to discern image detail even in the darkest parts of the image, and your retinas can compensate for a little too much light in some places better than they can compensate for too little light in other places. It's the lack of perceived detail caused by inadequate lighting that causes the most frustration -- people just blame the tint instead, because the tint is easier to be consciously aware of. Your eyes and brain don't auto-correct for the tint as effectively as they auto-correct for overall brightness, and when you're standing in the dark, it's cognitively difficult to blame inadequate lighting for your inability to see clearly when the alternative is to have no light at all.
- - -
Almost all of my home lighting has been LED for the past 8 years. A couple years ago I replaced all of my 2700K Philips LED bulbs with newer Sylvania LED bulbs in two different tints: 2700K and 3500K. I put the 3500K bulbs in places where I want to remain alert, such as my study and our living room, and I put the 2700K bulbs in places where I want to relax, such as the bedrooms. In the bathrooms I use a mixture of 3500K LED (for power savings) and halogen bulbs (for full-spectrum lighting). That way my girlfriend can put on her makeup (on the rare occasion she does so) with a good idea of what it will look like when we go out for the evening (assuming we make it that far).
I use a program on my computers called F.Lux to adjust the apparent color temperature of the screens from 6500K during the day to 4300K at night. I tried ~4500K lightbulbs at one point but I found them to be too stark for home lighting at night, though strangely the same tint works great for the large fluorescent bulbs in my kitchen. However, I prefer at least 4500K, all the way up to 6500K, for spotlighting objects with my flashlights at night; for whatever reason, I can discern colors more clearly at a distance, at night, with neutral-to-cool tinted light than I can with warm-tinted light. (calling 6500K "cool tint" is a bit of a misnomer, since it's the color of the sun itself, but it's definitely "cool tint" compared to old-fashioned incandescent heatbulbs.)
However, there is one caveat I've noticed: I bought two Makai flashlights recently, one with a cool-white Cree XM-L and the other with a neutral-warm-white Cree XP-L, and in some cases I can actually see better with the warmer-tinted XP-L. I think this is because the Makai is a thrower, so it's most useful for illuminating objects at a much longer distance than I normally do, and over such a long distance the brighter atmospheric backscatter from the cooler-tinted XM-L becomes a problem. (this is not a sciencey-sounding explanation like I mentioned above; I actually observed the additional backscatter in side-by-side tests.) Basically it's the same reason why automotive foglights are supposed to be yellow. However, it's only a minor nitpick, because within the brightest part of the hotspot I can still see more detail using the cooler-tinted XM-L. The corona and spill are more glaring than they are with the warmer-tinted XP-L, but let's be honest, with any thrower you're going to be paying attention to the objects in the brightest part of the hotspot anyway, because the corona doesn't reach very far, and the spill doesn't reach at all.
In general, it's been my observation that deviating from one's preferred tint is less problematic when the light is brighter overall. I think this is why the 4500K fluorescent bulbs in my kitchen don't bother me while the dimmer lighting in the rest of my house looked stark and depressing at the same tint. I think this is because brighter light ensures your retinas get an adequate amount of light to discern image detail even in the darkest parts of the image, and your retinas can compensate for a little too much light in some places better than they can compensate for too little light in other places. It's the lack of perceived detail caused by inadequate lighting that causes the most frustration -- people just blame the tint instead, because the tint is easier to be consciously aware of. Your eyes and brain don't auto-correct for the tint as effectively as they auto-correct for overall brightness, and when you're standing in the dark, it's cognitively difficult to blame inadequate lighting for your inability to see clearly when the alternative is to have no light at all.
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