Natural light spectrum.. Why do we use these so much blue lights?

[VintageReefer]

I will add this. The biggest impact on coral color is coral selection. Sanjay has a natural lit tank with colorful carefully selected corals. He doesn’t have a brown pocillopora tank. He might place that piece next to something brighter and make BOTH look good, through the artistic style of color contrast

Some of you have nice coral and that coral looks good regardless of light. Some of you have ugly drab coral and justify it as “natural lighting”. To each his own.

People ask me how I get neon or bright colored coral. Some people blame my heavy blue lighting or think it’s a effect or trick. I select bright colored or vibrant coral. The blue lighting doesn’t add anything that isn’t already there

Take this section from my frag rack

Oh it only looks those colors because of the heavy blues!!!

Let’s add white

Let’s remove blue and increase white. Back up to show more

Same light setting as above but closer

The reds in the Goni are red in all settings. The plate coral is pink and neon yellow in all photos

What’s happening is the blue brings out a little more of whatever’s there. It doesn’t create something that doesn’t exist. The blue also gives a darker backdrop to normally light areas, and the contrast makes bright colors stand out more

My corals are basically the same color under day or night spectrum. What changes is the background, and a little pop is added, but again, it’s not fake or unnatural. It’s natural and it exists.

I see tanks in this thread that would look equally good under either lighting. I see tanks that no amount of blue and uv light could ever make look colorful. Coral selection is key for a colorful tank.

 

[Reefering1]

I will add this. The biggest impact on coral color is coral selection. Sanjay has a natural lit tank with colorful carefully selected corals. He doesn’t have a brown pocillopora tank. He might place that piece next to something brighter and make BOTH look good, through the artistic style of color contrast

Some of you have nice coral and that coral looks good regardless of light. Some of you have ugly drab coral and justify it as “natural lighting”. To each his own.

People ask me how I get neon or bright colored coral. Some people blame my heavy blue lighting or think it’s a effect or trick. I select bright colored or vibrant coral. The blue lighting doesn’t add anything that isn’t already there

Take this section from my frag rack

Oh it only looks those colors because of the heavy blues!!!

Let’s add white

Let’s remove blue and increase white. Back up to show more

Same light setting as above but closer

The reds in the Goni are red in all settings. The plate coral is pink and neon yellow in all photos

What’s happening is the blue brings out a little more of whatever’s there. It doesn’t create something that doesn’t exist. The blue also gives a darker backdrop to normally light areas, and the contrast makes bright colors stand out more

My corals are basically the same color under day or night spectrum. What changes is the background, and a little pop is added, but again, it’s not fake or unnatural. It’s natural and it exists.

I see tanks in this thread that would look equally good under either lighting. I see tanks that no amount of blue and uv light could ever make look colorful. Coral selection is key for a colorful tank.

Those "whiter" pics are some of the best views of your tank that you ever shared. Try something for us. Take a picture of your tank, without any filters, where the sand looks white, coraline is pink/purple and we can see some rock color.

 

[VintageReefer]

No lens filter or any editing in any of these pics. Didn’t even do my weekend glass cleaning yet

5% blues
40% whites
0% Red and green

Increasing blues to 20%
Other setting the same.
No lens filter or editing
Photos come out more blue than in person

 

[VintageReefer]

And a whole lot of day light coming in from my patio door

 

[Reefer Matt]

Thinking out loud here, I’m wondering what’s the point of shaming others because their tank doesn’t look like you/we want it to? Must everyone conform to a set of standards for every tank? Or is it okay to be ambiguous and find our own style of reefing?

 

[Reefering1]

No lens filter or any editing in any of these pics. Didn’t even do my weekend glass cleaning yet

5% blues
40% whites
0% Red and green

Increasing blues to 20%
Other setting the same.
No lens filter or editing
Photos come out more blue than in person

Wow!! Look how much better that looks!! Look at the orange in those anthias, the soft pinks, teal, blues and purples!! Suddenly your husbandry is the backdrop with it all on display, the frag racks disappear and each piece could be inspected/viewed in full detail. THIS IS WHAT ITS SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE!!

 

[Reefering1]

I believe many people run the blues to hide the uglies and get used to it. But if you can't see it, how are they going to be on the up and ups with their tank?

 

[VintageReefer]

Wow!! Look how much better that looks!! Look at the orange in those anthias, the soft pinks, teal, blues and purples!! Suddenly your husbandry is the backdrop with it all on display, the frag racks disappear and each piece could be inspected/viewed in full detail. THIS IS WHAT ITS SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE!!

Maybe I should clean my glass and repeat this at night when I don’t have reflection of my patios vertical blinds lol

 

[Reefing102]

But the shallow pacific reefs don’t have a blue look. Why would those influential people push for bluer lighting?

I don’t believe the push was to go bluer but whiter. I would like to think the vast majority of the lighting industry in the early 90s, maintained around the 3500-4500k look, which on our tanks is very yellow. The shallow pacific reefs don’t look yellow, they look clear/very very light blue, at least that’s my color perception of photos and videos I see. The bluer yet whiter 10k spectrum gives that “clear look” at least to me, but I also run 10k halides.

Don’t get me wrong I enjoy the pop of certain colors with my blue LED bars but that 10k look, looks best to me.

I have no research or proof of any of this. I’m only hypothesizing. In my experience it generally takes an influential person to change things. Heck, it’s likely why there’s such popularity in LED, many reefers use FB, YouTube, instagram, etc. Give a few “influencers” (be it businesses like BRS or individuals) something to write about, it’s going to expand your customer base. I don’t know. Just thoughts.

 

[Reefering1]

Maybe I should clean my glass and repeat this at night when I don’t have reflection of my patios vertical blinds lol

What settings do you normally run? W,B,R,G percentages?

 

[VintageReefer]

Wow!! Look how much better that looks!! Look at the orange in those anthias, the soft pinks, teal, blues and purples!! Suddenly your husbandry is the backdrop with it all on display, the frag racks disappear and each piece could be inspected/viewed in full detail. THIS IS WHAT ITS SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE!!

I do think some people use lighting to hide uglies. As you can see, glass aside, my tank is nice looking without uglies even in white light. My sand is 10 years old and still bright white. It’s never been vacuumed or cleaned. The rocks are clean and covered in coraline or sponge. I have a large yellow sponge colony on the rock under the banana torch. I still feel coral selection and coral health is what makes a tank look good or bad. I’d you buy all brown or green coral, you will have a brown or green tank

 

[VintageReefer]

What settings do you normally run? W,B,R,G percentages?

Red 0
Green 0
Blue 40
White varies from 0 to 10 and back down to 0
Royal blue 40
Violet 40

 

[areefer01]

The video was simply to show where the best balance for visual appeal was at in terms of diverse colorations - emphasis on “visual” and you can go back and read my note that it had zero to do with science.

Define "best". That is more or less what the member was referring to. Best is subjective. Even if they used preferred one would ask 'to whom'. See the issue?

 

[Reefering1]

my tank is nice looking, without uglies, especiall y in white light.

Fixed it for you

 

[VintageReefer]

Fixed it for you

We’ll I’m glad I made you happy lol

I’ll be sure to include white pics in my photo updates so I can please both sides

There are people who love the blue look and message me asking how I get those pics and colors because they want to replicate it.

Then people who are complete opposite and think my tank must be ugly in whites or the colors are fake lol

 

[VintageReefer]

Fixed it for you

What do you think looks best? This is one of my favorite corals. No filters

And my banana torch is just as yellow in whites as is in blues. Nice colorful coral looks nice and colorful in all light.

 

[buruskeee]

Define "best". That is more or less what the member was referring to. Best is subjective. Even if they used preferred one would ask 'to whom'. See the issue?

Ummm… it’s literally right in your quote text.

“best balance” … “in terms of diverse colorations”

I never said “looks the best”. Looks the best is subjective. Most diverse coloration is not subjective. If you want more colors to show and differentiate corals you collect, you need to have
fluorescents excited (and windex blue might have the most, but it’s not the most diverse in coloration as many colors get washed out).

Literally everyone here is arguing their preference and shaming the other side. I simply gave reasons for BOTH sides along with including evidence that blue being more efficient , even though full spectrum will grow them just fine.

I’ll repeat - people love 6500K because it reminds them of scuba diving and have no interest in collector pieces, while others love the unique colors of collector pieces you cannot see under 6500K.

 

[buruskeee]

Sounds like you get it. Nobody would spend ridiculous money on nubs of brown sticks if there wasn't light and lenses to manipulate it into looking "cool". Many are here just to show off and validate themselves. Some corals look amazing just by looking at them, other require special lighting and photo editing just to see. Money makes the world go around and many people want to be "cool". They are suckers

Lololol so because someone likes something different than you, they are suckers. Why buy sneakers then, why buy sports cars when they take you to point A and B just the same - because it’s “cool”? What suckers man.

 

[Reefering1]

What do you think looks best? This is one of my favorite corals. No filters

And my banana torch is just as yellow in whites as is in blues. Nice colorful coral looks nice and colorful in all light.

Yea, the 1st one looks better with more blue. But you do lose the detail of the tentacles with the little balls on the end and texture of the flesh.
This coral loses something with the blue

Does your light have a way to auto tune to 10k/14k?

 

[Lasse]

1 Only blue 100% Around 23 000 degree K Input 143 W total
2 All blue + green and red 100 % around 21 000 input 143 + 88 = 231 W total
3 All my LED 100 % around 15 000 degree K 308 W total 143+88+77 = 308 W total

As you can see If I add only red and green to the all blue - I got a very whitish look and still have some of the flourescens colours all visibel. When I add white LEDs the fluorescence colours fade out - you do not see them very well because too much photons in the lumen window - the window there your eyes is most sensitive for light intensity

I have around 11 watt of this spectra, Note that around 15 % of the photons are in the blue par - it means an addition of around 2 W blue wavelengths

There is around 22 watt of this spectra, Around 25 % is blue wavelengths - let us add 5,5 watt more to the blue part

I have around 22 watt of this spectra. Note - around 35 % is blue. Addition of around 8 watt blue

This means that if I start all my white LED when running all my blue LEDs - I do not decrease my blue photons - instead I increase them with around 15 watt.

IMO - If you want a whitish look running all blue but still see the fluorescence - just add green and red to the blue. The intensity of the red and green decide how white it looks and how much florescence you will see. the reflecting colours well also look good as long as they not are in the yellow - orange part of the spectra. Or you can add a cheap RGB strip to your existing fixture

If you want a better growth and a white look - use white LEDs. You will probably not see so much of the florescence but your reflection colours will look great.

Note - the pictures are done using the same white balance and no filter

Sincerely Lasse