Correcting tint with LEE Filters

I’ve been using Lee filters for a couple of lights one even on a Nichia 219A HCRI light and it looks really good. The visual difference in light loss is negligible in real world use for me but the nice warm tint it gives is great for night time use when everything outside is extra blue from moonlight.

I had heard about them from a fellow member on cpf. Here is the thread from cpf. I recommend checking it out as there are very nice before and after beamshots with different filters and how they change the tint and color rendition of the beams.

Definitely recommend the filters for anyone interested in a quick cheap way to change tints on there cool white lights.

There is now a special range of Lee LED filters with a longer liftetime to correct color casts (five “Minus Green” and four “Amber” tints):

Cree Zircon Filters

Regards, Juergen

Thanks for the info, good stuff.

I’ll admit when I first read it I immediately thought the trade-off wasn’t worth it. But if you consider 14% is exactly two CREE bins, that helps put it in perspective. I’ll drop to an S6 if it meant ideal light quality. I currently favor my old 5B1 T4 85CRI XML2 (from before they had bond wire issues) over most any other tint in my collection… Yes… that means the Nichia’s too. I’ve tried them all. A, B, R9050. I think they are slightly green and a bit too cool for my taste (4000K is my sweet-spot)… They are pretty darn nice dedomed though, but just not bright enough and somewhat hard to focus.

Seems like it could benefit from LEE filter 279 'eighth minus green'. You could try getting a free sample book (here sheets are 90x35 mm) from a reseller to try it out.

I’ll move my questions here to keep from flooding clemences high cri nichia thread with off topic chatter:)

So have you tried the 1/8 minus green with a nichia 219c that has a yellowish tint? What is the result?

If 1/8minus green with 003 would give a tint close to nichia 219b 9080 then I would think the output loss worth it. At least in my case with home lighting.

they lose a lot of light, is the main negative…

since they absorb light, the filters may overheat at high light levels, it’s just something to think about

wle

Ya… the heat loss could be calculated I suppose. But that means Ild have to turn on my brain and I usually don’t start it up unless I’m trying to show off or something. :disguised_face:

The honest answer is that I have not (yet) used filters on Nichia LED’s because the offset from the BBL has been acceptable as is (offset lower than 0.003 - that is slight green/yellow. Green for CCT’s higher than 5000K and yellow for CCT’s 4000K and lower).
Today I made a test with some lights with Nichia 219C 4003 from clemence and Nichia 219C 4005 from Wfans and from KD. To make it easier to judge, I converted color coordinates (xc,yc) to CCT (in Kelvin) and offset from the BBL in units of 0.001, like this:
Color point example: 4250/3 (CCT / tint offset).
As 3 is positive the tint is to the green side. If negative to the magenta side.
This means that the color is 4250K and lies in the (shortest) distance from the BBL of 0.003.
0.001 is considered the smallest offset a human can see by comparing. 0.005 is easy to see and is approx. the amount that one layer of filter 279 changes the tint offset. A side effect of 279 is that it also draws the color some 100-200K towards warmer.

I do not have the Nichia 219B 9080 to compare with (yet), but here are results for 219C 4000:

(sorry, I have trouble with the Table editor, hope it is readable anyway).
table(table#posts).
|before | with filter | LED | vendor|

3959/1 3823/-3 4003 clemence
3961/3 3823/-2 4003 clemence
4033/1 3863/-4 4003 clemence
4322/-3 4223/-8 4005 Wfans
4066/-3 3894/-8 4005 KD

The LED’s from clemence has a rather yellow hotspot that looks much better with the filter. The spill becomes somewhat magenta, like from a 219A 4500. Interesting is that the LED’s 4005 from Wfans and KD does not need a filter.
But that could just be one lucky batch.

Here is how one layer of filter 279 worked for some other lights I put them in.
table(table#posts).
|before|with filter|LED|filter|
|4531/10|4381/4|xml T6|279|
|5673/15|6006/12|xml T6|279|
|5506/16|5686/12|xml T6|279|
|4007/8|3894/5|xml2 T5|279|
|4791/5|4584/1|xpl hi 3a|279|
|4552/10|4406/8|xpg R4|279|

Using other filters, 206 orange and 278 plus 1/8 green:
table(table#posts).
|before | with filter | LED | filters|

10088/5 6498/8 chineese 206
9850/-13 6614/-7 xpg2 206+278
11950/-13 6235/-4 chineese 206+278

No need to toss all the bad LED’s when a filter can do the job.

I’m sorry for not providing pictures, but it needs a better camera than mine and I doubt that the small differences involved can be seen on a picture anyway.
Regarding the concern about the filters being exposed to high temperatures, consider that they were developed for stage floodlights. What I found negative though, is do not rub them with water or spirits, the color will wash off.
Have fun and good filter hunting.

Interesting to read that, sixty545, and not just what the filter does, also the variation that is in the Nichia leds. Thanks for testing and posting! :slight_smile:

The change in color temp is very interesting. High temp gets higher and low temp gets lower?

The leds I have are 219c from clemence and yes they are yellow to me. I am very intrigued now. I don’t mind a bit of cct shift or the loss in output. The 219b has a lower output anyway. I was going to sell them off and wait for some 219b but I just might give this 279 filter a try and stick with the yellowish 229c.

Just a note to readers: when I say yellowish, I mean compared to other earlier nichias. When comparing to a cree led the 219c actually seems less yellow. I don’t want to give the wrong impression of the 219c.

Thanks for the helpful info!

Another thing about filters is, they are usually designed for ‘white’ light as input, or at least broad spectrum.

But LEDs don’t make white that way, they make BLUE, a very limited wavelength, then that goes through something that absorbs the blue and emits a YELLOW, again a narrow band of ‘colors’.

So if you are trying to make it come out green or red, it will be very inefficient.

I just use cellophane as colour filters. Mixed with different tint emitters opens up quite a range of colours.

yes, it works, here is a report

notice the 86.5% transmission rate, that means the filter will reduce the brightness by 13.5%
for example a 300 lumen level without the filter, would become a 260 lumen output when filtered through minus 1/8 green

I agree the 219c tends to be more yellow/green (varies by CCT) than the 219b

@indigon: that 219c does look better with the filter. From your picture the magenta is quite noticeable though. Is it more subtle to the naked eye?

Have any 4K 219c to put in front of it?

I’ve decided I’m going to place an order. I’m going to continue looking into it for a little while first though.

the 2 photos I reposted above, do NOT have the filter installed
the photo of the Manker Lad 219c is a 4000k led, and the 219b Worm next to it uses a 4500k LED
in the 4 beam photo I reposted (not mine), the third from the left, with the green tint, is what a 5000k 219c looks like. The 5000k 219c is more green than the 4000k 219c, but both are more Yellow than a Nichia 219b that has pink or magenta tint (not all N219b are pink btw)

note Im quoting indigo, you can contact him directly by following the link I posted,
in that thread he posted this picture, below, of a 5000k N219c after adding the minus 1/8 (far right), and compares it to an N219b 4000k, unfiltered (far left)
click the pic to go to that post for more info

Ya, sorry. I just started being lazy and dropped the 4500k 9080 from the 219b. Most of that emitter do have a hint of magenta/rosy as we say. Though some more than others. Thanks for the photo. I’ll do some more reading in the threads you linked.

Just got a Lee Filter #279 and put it in my Emisar D4 with SST20 4000K 95 CRI.

I do wonder if it is going to overheat and melt into my lens and optic. At peak power, the little 24mm circle of film is absorbing close to 600 lumens of light.

However, the D4 won’t sustain turbo for long, and within 30 seconds, absorption is probably down to 100 lumens or less. Still… it’s an offly tiny bit of plastic to absorb such heat.

Don’t use the lee filter over high powered LEDs unless it’s a zircon filter. I don’t think it will straight up melt, but over time probably fade and maybe bubble.

I’ve had a piece of Lee 249 1/4 minus green between the optic and glass of my 219C D4 since December. I run the light on turbo fairly often. No issues yet.