Effects of lighting on your materials

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Reciprocity: light effects are cumulative in a simple additive manner. Even if you are using a flash, if you wanted to damage your material you'll need approximately 3600 flashes per day.

The light used in flatbed scanners doesn't affect your materials as well. See Light Levels Used in Modern Flatbed Scanners, by Timothy Vitale.

Lighting sources

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Light source CCT (K) CRI >90 85-70 70-60 60-40 40-30 30-20
Daylight 5500-6000 x
Incandescendent 3200 x
Halogen bulb 3200 x
Ultra high CRI LED (purple) 2700-5000 x
Standard LED 2700-5000 x
High CRI LED (blue) 2700-5000 x

LED lighting

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Halogen bulbs

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Color temperature

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Color Rendering Index

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Measuring the CRI of your lighting sources

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Workspace lighting

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For shooting studio, you should use Matte black.

For editing, you need

  • No glare from lights or windows, no bright or reflective things.
  • All lighting should be D50 (5000 Kelving).
  • Painting should match the N8 Gray Munsell. Since this painting might not be easy to get in your country, it is possible to make the formula yourself if you take the numbers to your painting store, using a pastel-tint white as a base.