After working at Image-Engine, I realized how important color temperature is. When you take a picture indoor and it looks all yellowish, that’s because the ambient color temperature is ‘low’. Most cheapish light bulbs have a color temperature around 3000K. When you are outside, the color temperature is usually between 4000K and 6500K.

Today I decided to replace the light bulb over my desk at home with a 5000K+ light. Since almost nobody knows about color temperature, it is mostly absent from the technical specifications of cheapish light bulbs. It’s hard to know which one to buy. Luckily the Energy star website has a complete list of its certified light bulbs, with their respective color temperature.

I’ll probably get a Philips ‘Mini Twister Daylight Compact Fluorescent Bulb’, it is supposed to be ‘daylight’-like, with a color temperature of 6500K and a good luminance.