# What Spectrum Lighting Brings Out Fish Colors?



## smiller (Feb 11, 2012)

I read in a thread about actinic lighting really bringing out the color in many cichlids. Do many of you use actinic lighting in your setup? What difference have you seen with and without?

Thanks for your input.


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## 123vb123 (Feb 10, 2012)

UP for this thread, would like to know too


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## rck1984 (Feb 13, 2012)

smiller said:


> I read in a thread about actinic lighting really bringing out the color in many cichlids. Do many of you use actinic lighting in your setup? What difference have you seen with and without?
> 
> Thanks for your input.


The difference is incredible. I have been using just two white lightbulbs in the beginning of my current Tang tank. Charged it into one white lightbulb of 12k and one pure actinic and dimmed both for about 50%. The difference is crazy, I never go back!

I am using: 1x Sylvania Aquastar and 1x Aqua Medic Blue Reef Actinic.

White lightbulbs, 100% and no actinic:


IMG_7552 by Rck1984F, on Flickr

1 white 12k, one actinic both on 50%:


Paracyprichromis Brieni Velifer by Rck1984F, on Flickr

Pics describe a lot more then plain text in this case.

*Note*: The Paracyprichromis on the first picture is a little younger then the one on the second, therefore it has a bit more color as well. But I can tell you, the actinic light is one of the best, if not the best investment on my tank in the recent months!


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## ranchialex (Dec 4, 2011)

I have a mysterious 'blue tube' that I think is close to actinic and it's very helpful. I think I have 1 6,500Ã‚Â° tube and a 15,000Ã‚Â°. I should probably have more, but I'm pretty happy.


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## Vadimshevchuk (May 23, 2009)

yeah it is true. That is why reefers run 20k instead of 10k even though when you use 10k you grow corals better. i prefer the color spectrum for cichlids to be 12-14k


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## Steveboos (Dec 23, 2011)

I've noticed the colors of my Cichlids in my current tank with 2 10K lights is not as vivid as when i had a single 48" 50/50 bulb on the 55 gallon. The yellows of the labs are nice and bright, but the blues of the Demasoni's are no where near what they used to be with the actinic light.


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## DanniGirl (Jan 25, 2007)

Depends what type of colors you're trying to emphasize.

To enhance the blues in my tank, I use true actinics (2 Philips TL 20W/03) in conjunction with 50/50's.


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## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

I've thought about this and I don't know if I'm right, but thinking about how visible light works may offer some insight into the best light color to choose for your fish.

What we see as color is actually reflected light of certain wavelengths. Something that is yellow reflects yellow light, and absorbs all other wavelengths. Something that is blue reflects blue light, and absorbs all other wavelengths. Black absorbs all wavelengths of light, and white reflects all wavelengths of light.

So a yellow lab is bright yellow and reflects yellow wavelengths in light. A demasoni is blue and reflects blue wavelengths. So my first thought was to match light spectrum to your fish species. For yellow labs, warmer spectrums contain more light in the yellow spectrum, which means the labs should reflect more of the light and look brighter. For demasoni, cooler lighting and blue actinics contain blue wavelengths that the blue fish reflects making them look brighter.

But that can't be the whole story, or else yellow fish would not look good at all under cool lighting and blue actinic, as there is not much light of yellow wavelengths to reflect. I think the other half might be choosing a light spectrum that the fish can stand out in. For example, if you use nothing but blue lighting, it may make a cool effect, but everything looks blue, so even blue fish that can reflect that wavelength can't stand out.

My current thinking is that you want your light to contain wavelengths in its spectrum equal to the color of the fish, so the fish will reflect those colors and look very bright, but you want the _average_ color of the light to be different from the color of the fish so that the fish will stand out.

I kinda used this thinking to select lighting for my 90 gallon. I have labs and estherae in there (yellow/orange/warm colors), and I have a moorii (cool blue). With the moorii being young and not very much different from silver right now, they didn't provide me a good data point. BUT, the labs and estherae seem to support my theory. I brought home 2x 6500K bulbs and 2x 3000K bulbs, all T8. The labs and estherae looked worst under the 6500K bulbs alone. Made sense to me, cooler light that doesn't contain the yellow and orange wavelengths to reflect off the fish and look bright. Under the 3000K bulbs, the labs and estherae looked extremely bright, if I got up real close and just focused on the fish. However, when I stepped back and took in the whole tank, it was very warm looking and the fish didn't really stand out against the light reflecting off the rocks and sand. Finally, mixing the 3000K and 6500K bulbs gave me the best look. The labs and estherae still looked bright up close (thought not as bright as with the 3000K bulbs alone), however they still look bright and stand out when I take a step back from the tank, because the average light in the tank is no longer as warm.

So extrapolating back, I think thats why full spectrum lighting often looks good for a variety of fish. Full spectrum lighting containing all wavelengths means any fish color will have some of "their" wavelengths of light to reflect, and will stand out against the overall average light color. I think mixing bulbs of different colors together mimics that effect, and in fact can be better customized to the colors of the species you keep. In the end there is still personal preference in play, and intensity and CRI play a part as well. I don't really think there is a complete scientific answer to the question, or even an answer that EVERYONE will agree looks best, so I guess you just gotta try different options until you find a light that makes your fish look best to you.


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## smiller (Feb 11, 2012)

Nice post and very thought provoking. Thanks.


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## 13razorbackfan (Sep 28, 2011)

I have one 10000k, one 6500k super daylight and two actinic. I like it very much.


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## 123vb123 (Feb 10, 2012)

13razorbackfan said:


> I have one 10000k, one 6500k super daylight and two actinic. I like it very much.


10000k, so you got a 10.000.000w light? So now all the neighbors live in darkness?


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## 13razorbackfan (Sep 28, 2011)

123vb123 said:


> 13razorbackfan said:
> 
> 
> > I have one 10000k, one 6500k super daylight and two actinic. I like it very much.
> ...


10000k is 10000 kelvin which is color temp.


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## BillD (May 17, 2005)

Rhinox raises some interesting points. It seems that most aquarists want to make their fish out to be something they aren't. A fish's natural colours are evident under sunlight, which has a CRI of 100 and is the natural basis for comparison. The colour temp of sunlight at noon at the equator is about 5500K. Lamps in the 6500K range try to emulate morning or afternoon sun. In all cases, lamps are approximations at best, and CRI is a better indicator of what colours will look like than colour temp. As well, lamps from different manufacturers of the same colour temp can have radically different CRIs. Even from the same manufaturer lamps can vary in CRI. As an example, the T12 Philips 6500K Daylight tube has a CRI in the low 80s while the 5000K Natural Sunlight has a CRI in low 90s. In T8 from the Philips, the 6500K has a higher CRI than the 5000K, with both being in the 90s. To me the T12 Daylights look very blue and don't render green plants correctly. there are also the Plant and Aquarium tubes which have a lot of blue and red in them, aren't particularly bright, but are probably the cheapest way to accent reds and blues, even if mixed with another more natural looking tubes.
In the original post here, the differences in the two photos are partially a product of the lights being dimmed


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## Shahlvah (Dec 28, 2011)

50 / 50 here, I like it....probably until I can buy something better....LOL :dancing:


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## fmueller (Jan 11, 2004)

Rhinox said:


> For yellow labs, warmer spectrums contain more light in the yellow spectrum, which means the labs should reflect more of the light and look brighter. For demasoni, cooler lighting and blue actinics contain blue wavelengths that the blue fish reflects making them look brighter. But that can't be the whole story.


That is the whole story! You absolutely hit the nail on the head with this. Everything else just makes things look more complex than they are in reality. The reason a yellow fish still looks pretty decent in blue light is that even blue light isn't purely blue. It still has enough of a yellow component to make the yellow fish look ok. That's all there is to it.


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