this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2024
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Itvs interesting that you find yellow light to be harsh. Normally, the yellower tones (2700k-3500k) are called warm and soft white. Daylight is 6500k with a notable blue tone and neutral white is somewhere around 4500K. Is your office also filled with brown/dirty surfaces that seem highlighted by the warm light or grays that clash with it? Florescent lights (and cheap LEDs) are especially harsh in general because they have really bad color rendering, meaning certain tones get muted and distort perception. Letting in daylight may just be helping restore color vibrance. Bluer lights also tend to have more UV output, which makes them more painful at night. Yellower lights lean towards the red end and aren't so jarring for the same brightness. Bluer lights get used in hospital, lab, and other high-detail settings for more clarity, while yellower lights get used in more relaxed environments where visual detail is less important.
I wouldn't guess you have a different cone count, but I would guess there's some underlying perceptions about colors and visuals.
No, most of the places I notice my aversion to yellow light have pretty neutral colours; off-whites, greys, the occasional green. I haven't looked into it, but I would say the yellow lights (at least the ones that bother me) distort the colours more. I have no idea when the Colour Rendering Index of them are, just that they seem much hasher. Maybe yellow lights are more tolerable to most people, so they install more? Yellow lights aren't rated for higher power though. Maybe it's purely the colour temperature, maybe it has to do with sun exposure and cloudy days?
Just the CRI wouldn't explain why some people find the addition of artificial light unnecessary at best while others seem to need it to see. There's probably some amount learned perception going on, but I don't think you can learn to be blind to certain light, can you?
There's certainly a tipping point where light becomes too yellow to accurately represent color. I was recently shopping bathroom vanities and some showed what the greens and blues would look like under different color temps, with 2700K just about ruining the appearance. I also painted a room in light blues and had to change the adjustable lights to 3500K, if I remember correctly.
I'm just intrigued and thinking out loud. I'm having a hard time describing yellower as harsh. I could see the overhead lights doing a better job at flooding an area and minimizing shadows, whereas window light would be diffused but still somewhat of a point-source depending on distance. The "backrooms" image of the empty office space certainly comes to mind where it's all a vague shade of yellow-green.
As far as people who can't seem to see anything under wandering daylight, IME, they tend to be a mix of people who are either older (reduced dark vision, reduced focus) and impatient people (who don't understand your eyes take 5 seconds to adjust pupil size but 20 minutes to refill rhodopsin, your night vision juice). Or just people who demand conformity. Or a 4th group I suppose, who have max-brightness screens that doesn't play with eyes well against dark backgrounds. I do personally prefer natural light and wait for my eyes to prove they can't see enough before using lights, except for when I have physical tasks to do like cook or repair something.
Apologies for seeming like I was telling you you're wrong. I was trying to get your perspective but just rambled in my own opinions. Lights are a notable hobby for me, sort of. Headlights, flashlights, night lights, street lights, light pollution, night sight, neon lights, uv lights... I read up on lights weirdly often.
Oh, no problems! Colour rendering isn't an angle I'd thought of yet, and clashing colours is definitely something I'll think aboit next time.
I do have to wonder if my aversion is learned, as I am very much not a morning person, so waking up by strong sunlight or room light are both negative experiences. I'm also a big fan of rainy days, and I wonder how much the light colours play into that and how.