What I Learned Today:Not all Ott lights are created equal.

DuPapa

Recently, the Ott company started placing the words "True Color" on the lamps and the packaging of their True Color products. This makes it very easy to tell whether you are purchasing a True Color fixture/bulb.

Artificial lighting is rated using a rating system called CRI (for Color Rendition Index) where sunlight has a CRI of 100. The higher the CRI, the more the light from a bulb is like natural sunlight. Following are the CRIs for the Ott bulbs:

Normal non-Ott fluorescent bulb - 70 CRI
Ott Task bulb- 83 CRI
Ott True Color bulb - 93 CRI

TRUE COLOR BULB WITH ROUNDED END


TASK BULBS WITHOUT ROUNDED ENDS



Task Lamp on the left and the True Color lamp on the right.

ricko

Interesting... thanks for the information... Cheers, RickO

DuPapa

Link

JRocco

I didn't know that .
Thanks a lot for the heads up.

mgoodm3

Those photos showing of the differences between lights is mainly a white balance issue with the camera taking the picture. You will have a hard time distinguishing pics done properly with a 83 CRI vs 93 CRI.

CRI is not the greatest measure of lighting but it is a reasonable benchmark to use. Ott lights are not the only fluorescent bulbs out there that have good color rendition.

DuPapa

Ott lights are not the only fluorescent bulbs out there that have good color rendition.


I don't have any Ott band myself. I use the OtOtt brand (Other than Ott brand)

The thing I like about the flouresent types is their 10,000 hour life and low operating temperature.