flashy,
Yes, in small form factors, the LED's have an advantage in runtime, and maybe even output.
However, they cannot touch an incan when it comes to color differentiation and rendition.
You are right, it does have something to do with what we grew up with, but it has more to do with how our eyes are made!
We see yellows, reds, and greens for a reason. The blue, high temp light emitted by even the warmest LED's screws with that vision. One of the famous CPF'ers calls it the "walking on the moon effect."
Essentially, our atmosphere attenuates some of the blue light produced by the Sun, and our eyes have developed to see those colors under Sunlight as it arrives through that atmosphere. When you take away the yellows and reds, like an LED does, we lose the ability to have accurate depth perception.
Have you ever been in a gymnasium lit by HID lights? If so, and if you are a basketball player, you will immediately notice that your depth perception of where the basket is has changed, and that your shots must be adjusted. Most gyms have adjusted for this by using lamps that have a yellowish cast, but there are a few with blue vapor lights or blue fluorescents still out there.
Ever wonder why people haven't replaced all their home incandescents with those cool new compact fluorescents that use less energy but create as much light? Same reason. People like that warmer incan glow. It's not all learned, it's also genetic.
PURE white is a misnomer, because PURE white results when ALL the wavelengths are available. LED's don't provide PURE white, they don't have the and greens and reds necessary to create PURE white.
I can come closer to PURE white using 3 different LED's, one red, one green, one blue, than any single LED can. Unfortunately, a light blending the three correctly isn't available yet.
My wife is a professional photographer. She gives talks to amateur groups. Before she starts though, I start by turning off all the lights, and then I uncover a bunch of familiar items I had previously placed in the front of the room. I turn on different LED's and and ask the people in the audience to write down the color of the objects.
They always get the Blue ones right with an LED, but the answers for yellows, and reds, and greens are all over the scale.
Without the clues that we pick up from tint, depth perception and many other valuable day to day visual activities are impaired.
Are incans dead? Not until we have full spectrum LED's and that day isn't in the very near future.
Bill
