LED's are not good at producing a full spectrum of light. What looks like a
white LED is really not white in the same sense that sunlight or
incandescent light might be. If you shine an LED flashlight and an
incandescent flashlight on something with subtle coloration, your eyes will
pick up the coloration better from the incandescent flashlight. I like LED
flashlights and have several different ones. They are superior to
incandescent flashlights in most ways, but this characteristic is an
exception.
Any colored item that transmits or reflects light will block certain other
colors of light. So you're better off to start with a red LED so you don't
lose other light wavelengths. You don't have this option with incandescent
bulbs- LED's can be manufactured to produce specific light wavelengths but
incandescent bulbs will produce a wider spectrum.
> I think I read that if you use white LEDs in an application that has a red
> lens (like an MGB tail light) then the red lens will cancel out all but
> the
> red wavelengths coming from the LED (which won't be that much on a white
> LED). They recommend that you use red LEDs with red lenses.
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