Ah, well, at least with white LEDs you’ll know you are doing damage when you stare into them. 
Oh and actually white explains the 3.3v forward voltage as well. 
lol
stares into LEDs…ouch eyes bleed
why, do speccific colors have specific voltages? 
Different types of LEDs have different operating voltages, based on the semiconductor chemistry and method used to produce the light.
lol 
well, guys, quick update on the LEDs, got a breaboard today and set up wat 1 of the turrents/bar lights will look like on my rover, took some before and after pictures in the dark, its not too impressive, but i think it will be ok
img2.putfile.com/thumb/6/16122523779.jpg
img2.putfile.com/thumb/6/16122523747.jpg
well, what do u think , not bery bright eh? my eyes kinda bled/melted wen i first turned them on
thats 15 LEDs, im going to have 60 on the rover
That’s going to be bright!!! 
Chunga, my eyes are bleeding just looking at a photo!
What would you consider a good mcd for a LED that will illuminate a sheet of transparent acrylic/lexan?
yes, i think it would be plenty birght lol
Chunga,
LEDs function quite differently from most other components we encounter in the robot electronics world. Instead of being fed with a constant voltage, they need to be fed with a constant current. When your getting started with electronics (and I say that without any sense that I really have any meaningful handle on it all yet) its easy to see these things as being fundamentally different. But they are not necessarily. The resistor driving the LED technique is about taking a known constant voltage and dividing it down to a known constant current.
How all this answers your original question, well… it doesn’t at all. It just seemed that you were struggling with a concept that took me longer than it should have to learn and I wanted to share
Im using IR LED’s. na naw na naw na