Re: I'm an LED tint snob!
Personally, I don't mind whether a LED is warm white, cool white or neutral as long as it is bright enough to see by. My knowledge of the subject is very limited but I always understood the eye was very good at compensating for differences in lighting. Daylight under a clear sky is blueish due to the amount of blue in the sky, and shadows under a blue sky are very blue, but who actually 'sees' that? Bearing that in mind I don't see why a slightly blue LED should be the problem that it seems to be for a lot of people, unless you are doing some task that requires very detailed color matching. Obviously I'm missing something. When walking the dog at night I don't mind if a tree looks a bit blue or even a bit yellow as long as I can see it!
Howdy Dave and welcome to CPF. Yes, the eye (actually the brain) is VERY good at helping to compensate for the different colors of light we encounter every day, but there are those of us who, through experience, have become acutely aware of these different colors of light.
I got my degree in photography and was a professional color printer for many years, so my eyes are finely tuned to notice those things. Before we had the automatic white balance found it today's digital cameras, we had to use a yellow filter to get rid of that extreme bluish light found in the shade, and we had to use a magenta filter to get rid of the greenish cast found under typical florescent lighting. So, I'm especially sensitive to tint, and while none of my lights had a "horrible" tint, I found that color correcting them gives me a more pleasant experience.
It's one of those things you might not even notice until you see an unfiltered light next to a correctly filtered one, and all of a sudden you go "oh", and from then on you find that a more neutral tint is higher on your list of priorities when selecting a new light.
What's neat is that now I don't have to delete a light from my list of candidates just because it doesn't have a neutral LED, because I know I can filter it when it arrives and get it close to my personal preference.
As far as using LED lights outside, that's probably the primary reason you SHOULD consider using filters to color correct your light. When you shine a light with a noticeable cyanish or bluish tint on bushes, ground, or trees, you'll find the contrast much lower, and if you filter out that cyanish light, all of a sudden the colors become distinct with much higher contrast, hopefully making outdoor walking not only more enjoyable, but safer as well.
However, if you're happy with your lights the way they are, that's fine. It's very possible your lights came with LEDs that already have good color rendering qualities. I'm not trying to convert anybody, I've just been reading lately how many folks have been unhappy with the tint of their lights and thought I would share this easy, inexpensive, and totally reversible method that I have found works so well for me.
Mat, I used the filter on page 90 for my new Fenix SS LD01. Of course it is on the outside of the glass, so it will eventually get scratched up and might need to be replaced, but so far it's been in my pocket for a week and the filter still looks pristine. I don't mind replacing the filter occasionally if that's what it takes to get beautifully colored light from this neat little flashlight.
The filter on page 90 would be a good place for you to start, but be sure and try LOTS of others. Often the differences can be subtle, which is why I like evaluating the light using soup can labels, or colorful books, etc. When you get the right filter the colors tend to look "right". Also, your idea of what's a good tint might be completely different from my idea of a good tint, so only use the page numbers as a starting point.
Diablo_331, I don't have the Zebralight SC51c, so I can't comment on that, but the beam shots I've seen posted show it with excellent color rendering abilities as it is.
Remember, if you are trying to get a "whiter" light, generally what you will be doing is FILTERING OUT the excessive or dominant color of the LED, and you do that by picking a filter that is the OPPOSITE color of the one you are trying to filter out.
Here is a color wheel:
http://www.colormatters.com/colortheory.html
Just look at the wheel and find the color that closely matches the current tint of flashlight (the tint that you want to change or get rid of), then look at the opposite side of the wheel and that will show you the color that you should be starting with to get rid of the offending tint, although you will probably want to start with a lighter variation of that color, as the darker the filter, the more you will reduce the output of your light, so go with the lightest filter you can live with.
So, if your light has a greenish color, then add a magenta filter. If your light has a cyanish color (green AND blue), then add a red or orange filter (which is magenta and yellow). If your light has an excessive yellow cast, add a blue filter. This will reduce that dominate color and provide a more balanced spectral output.
The main mistake that most folks make, who are new to color correction, is that they tend to over correct. The easiest way to approach this is to
NOT try to perfectly correct the tint, but just help it become closer to your ideal. Obviously the more time you spend playing with the filters, the better your chances of finding the right one, and
giving your eyes a rest between sessions will help as well.
Of course the great thing about this is that you can always go back and easily change to a different filter if you ever decide you want to.
In any case, I'm glad to hear that you'all are experimenting with these filters, and I'll be interested to follow everybody's progress.
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