Warm or cool?

[Cartwright26]

What do people prefer to use for lamp leds warm or cool and are there any pros and cons to either?

 

[ZombieCake]

Hi,
I prefer cool.  I guess it's all down to the colour temperature of the LEDs and what you like.  Cool ones (higher colour temperature in degrees Kelvin) are more blue - nearer midday sun, warm ones (lower colour temperature) tend to err more towards the yellow / red end of the spectrum (not quite to that of incandescent bulbs and the lower temperatures pushing to candle & carbide light).  I prefer the more blue end as that's nearer brighter daylight.  I guess it's all personal preference at the end of the day.  I suppose almost a Coke vs Pepsi debate!  Slightly warmer may look nice in photos - thinking of the old school 81A filters here, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and everybody's eyes are different.  Some cheaper LEDs seem to have a purple or greenish tinge which isn't that nice so best avoided.
Still going back a good few years can't beat the warm glow of a carbide at the bottom of something cold and continental, yet there again white LEDS weren't invented then, and lights of the day were incandescent which tended towards the lower colour temperatures, i.e the yellow end of the spectrum so that's what your eyes adjusted to after a while, so it seems to me the colour of a cave is what you light it with.

 

[pwhole]

I use LED lamps that are relatively 'daylight' in spectrum - around 6500K. and my Stenlight is pretty damn close to those too, which makes light painting easier. White Balance on the camera is important though, and I get best results with these lights on the 'Warm Fluorescent' setting. If you shoot in RAW or use Lightroom or similar, you'll have magenta-green and yellow-blue tint options after loading, and you can always add a bit of 'overall red' later on if it still looks a bit cold.

 

[caving_fox]

My P4 scurion is relatively blue, and given a free choice I'd probably have gone slightly more redshifted. I find it's sometimes harder to distinguish features pick my footing than I was used to on an disticntly yellow FX3 beforehand (although the brightness compensates for a lot). It does depend a lot on the particular rock/mud you're caving across, but it's just about the only niggle I have with it.

 

[Madness]

I never really bother considering colour temperature. I tend to go for the type with the highest lumen output. More 'bang for your buck'

 

[Tangent_tracker]

Just purchased some neutrel (5000k) XML's for my lamp. Just waiting for a couple more bits before I give the thing a long awaited overhaul but will be interesting to see the difference

 

[global_s]

On my new pulsar I've asked for a colder Led on the beam with a warm on the flood. Will report back when the dam thing actually arrives.

 

[pwhole]

One of my caving partners has a Scurion, and I generally have to remove the blue cast caused by her light in photos - however, it's not a major issue and easily fixed in Photoshop or similar. Obviously all my lights are tilted more to red than the LEDs they use.

 

[potholer]

Personally I prefer neutral white, and these days there doesn't seem a meaningful penalty in lumens the way there was some years ago.

Colour rendition is more natural than cool white, though for non-photographers that's maybe less of an issue underground where rock is shades or grey or brown and coloured things tend to be strongly coloured.
It does seem noticeable on grass - less of the odd blue tint that cool LEDs can give.

Certainly, your eyes tend to adjust, making all manner of versions of 'white' look 'properly' white, but having run neutral LEDs in my main light for a few years following on from the previous (1A) cool white, I get the vague feeling that I feel just a little bit less cold.

 

[D.Snaith]

I prefer warm Joe, its better in photos, if i get another though, i think i will get a cool as it is slightly brighter.