Why do you buy lights without High-CRI emitters?

thanks for reminding me of those photos
the NoLens looks a lot better!
the with Lens looks exactly like my yellow/green donut hole
fortunately I knew what I was getting into beforehand, so not distressed

I bought the Low CRI light intending to have it modded to Nichia anyway
I will add AssPheric lens replacement to the goals list, a diffuser film may be in order…

Please post in the Utorch thread if you find a decent replacement lens. It works well as a mule but the aspheric gives it an interesting character were it not for the crazy color the stock plastic lens adds. (I don’t really KNOW if it’s the plastic that affects it, just thought it was worth mentioning).

Gotta add I’m feeling pretty dull compared to my fellow flashoholics. Besides working on equipment in the daytime and using flashlights to overcome daylight adjusted eyes when peering in ancient machines I mostly use my flashlights for object avoidance at night. I’m an old dad with young kids, old kids, and grandkids so there is always a high probability of stepping on a toy or something that shouldn’t be on the floor.
I could get by with a flashlight that only showed grayscale.

In the past, i bought lights without high Cri because I didn’t know/care about CRI.
Now, i buy lights without high CRI to mod them with my Nichia high CRI :smiley:
Also i buy low CRI because i have enough high CRI in my collection.
I have changed over half of my flashlights’ leds to the 219B sw45 R9080.
For me now, tint is even more important than cri, bad tint is more noticeable

Good point TK…… :+1: … :smiley:
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Cognition Ahead

Blessed be the peace keepers.

Nice…… :beer: . :wink:

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from Jason Hui over at Prometheus Lights;

” _When you order a MIL/LEO Alpha you can choose your LED, but I still recommend the “Maker’s Choice” MCE 4500K LED. I have two theories on this. First, these are 82 CRI minimum and I believe the enhanced color rendering will allow your brain to recognize features and make decisions more quickly. It’s just a theory, but when life demands split second decision making, I want to reduce the workload on my brain as much as I can.”
_

Interesting spin, which of the following lights reduces the workload, processing time, the most, for you?

I can understand better now, why people say NW low CRI shows colors well, even CW Low CRI shows relative colors. In the next pic I removed the worm from bottom right above, and added a Thorfire TK05 CW XP-G3 Low CRI

Use whatever light you like, choices are good. Our brain is really good at adjusting its white balance and relative color perception, even when a light has Low R9. I would go so far as to say our brain is much more forgiving than the camera, which in itself is quite good at adapting to different relative colors.

thanks to all for sharing your thoughts

From the ridiculous to the sublime

Even with a Green Filter, I can tell the fruit colors apart in real life:

I hear deer dont spook when illuminated with a Green Beam :slight_smile:

Hmmmm…. looks like you ate a tomato & replaced it with an orange. :wink:

You are very perceptive!

fwiw, Deer cant see Red, and I can still tell the fruits apart

Blue works for me to tell colors apart too, but deer can see it really well, so you Will be noticed

Bottom line is everybody is right, it makes absolutely no difference what CRI or color a light is, you can still tell colors apart from each other.

There would be no need for High CRI if relative color was all I cared about. I think the Blue looks “cool”

lol

That says more about the filter than about the light source. The filter is letting non-green shades through. Here’s a true green filter applied in a checkerboard pattern:

The physical filter certainly decreases non-green shades quite a bit, but it’s still letting through enough to make out some other shades.

For comparison, here’s the same perfect* filter applied to an earlier pic.

* “Perfect” meaning the red and blue channels were completely zeroed out before saving, but jpeg compression has added small non-zero values in some places.

Yes.
Same happens with Low CRI NW lights with Yellow Tint, and Low CRI CW lights with Green or Blue Tint. They still allow the operator to tell fruits apart, in real life, even if they look Yellow or Green when white wall hunting.

So, why would anybody bother to buy a light with High CRI?
Why all the hype, what can High CRI do that Low CRI can’t, and why should I even care about CRI?

When HDS can sell Low CRI lights, with yellow or green tint, or even blue, why bother stocking the Nichia model? I hear the Nichia is not even as bright.

All this Tint and CRI stuff sounds like a first world problem. Any Tint light will let me see in the dark. Why be such a Tint and CRI Snob, and why do I keep buying more lights?:slight_smile:

I learnt all I needed to know (though I didn’t realise it at the time) one night with two Convoy S2+ models and a BLF A6.

1) Shine cool white 1A Convoy around the garden, look at the grass and all the coloured flowers, browns etc. - LOOKS GOOD!

2) Shine warm white 4C Convoy around the garden, look at the grass and all the coloured flowers, browns etc. - LOOKS GOOD!

3) Compare the two side by side, it becomes obvious that something in-between would be better, colours are, compared to each other, either washed out or browned out to some extent.

4) Hold the two together, double the lumens and a neutral white combination beam - LOOKS GREAT!

5) Compare the two Convoys together to the neutral white 3D A6 - VIRTUALLY IDENTICAL, in both lumens and colour!

Since then neutral white seems obviously best for me, in anything but a thrower, and the A6 with probably 70CRI shows a variety of colours better to my eye than any high CRI light I have tried since. Any attempts to beat it on colour have failed, my Q8 beats it on lumens and equals it on colours, but I think it has the same spec emitters. My neutral white H03 seems to be about the same as well, with a lovely even floody beam, but also I think only 70CRI.

I have 2 A01s with 90CRI Nichia emitters, but one is too cool and one is too warm, exactly the same sort of results as with the Convoys, their temp taints the colour, so there does not appear to be any advantage to the high CRI for me unless combined with neutral temp.

I have an S41S with neutral white Nichia 90CRI emitters on the way. This may be my last attempt to place a value on CRI above 70. I honestly don’t expect to notice a difference, and if so, the increased heat output, weight, and aggressive knurling will likely have me back to the A6 as my favourite.

Sounds happy, you like your 5000k light and its CCT matters more to you than its CRI.
S41S has a 5000k 219c, so you might like it, seems like a fair test. Go for the CCT you want first, then add CRI frosting.

Maybe we can stop buying new lights soon :slight_smile:

ps, watch out for vague terms like neutral and warm. Look at this listing, it has a 5000k light it calls warm, but they were just calling 5000k neutral in the S41…

CCT is more specific. Its good to know what you want. I like neutral white, but I mean 4000k. Not a fan of 5000k myself. In fact I just listed my 5500k High CRI light for sale. I was not impressed with the CRI either.
here is the ad

Minor note: S41S != S42S

One was generally well-regarded, the other was mostly a failure.

(edit: the post I was responding to has been edited for clarity)

This is the way I choose my lights nowdays. Hi cri is stil preferred, and I can clearly see the difference with lower CRI, but CCT is my main concern. I try to get al my lights around 4000k.

Actually I only have one 5000k light left that I use as a daytime light, as 4000k just looks yellow compared to daylight.

Also I try not to switch between CCTs and tints as you get reminded by the differences and start comparing again and I just want to use my lights.

I have my s1mini, D4 and D1S all in 5D tint now and I can use them at the same time without going in jon_slider mode :wink:

I hope I get a good one, my understanding is that the S42 models have an annoying UI, but the S41 I have ordered should have the A6 UI, which I really like.
Ordered it mid-April so will only find out around June/July, average delivery to me so far 77.1 days.