Lighting chromaticity plays a critical role in the visual perception of rendered content embedded within virtual scenes. Consequently, much effort is made to reduce differences in lighting chromaticity between these, to avoid an unnatural combined appearance. However, it is not currently known ”how” different these lighting conditions can be before people can notice them, or before it becomes detrimental to visual appearance. In this study, three psychophysical tasks are employed to assess participants’ perception of simulated lighting conditions applied separately to rendered virtual backgrounds and virtual objects, with a focus on stimuli comprising human faces. The tasks assessed the influence of object characteristics (variable skin tone), and differences in lighting chromaticity (between scenes and objects) on visual assessments for perceived lighting matches, mismatches, and preferences. Results revealed that both object and lighting characteristics significantly influenced each perceptual judgment, in different ways. Chromaticity matches, mismatches, and preferences for facial stimuli depended on the scene chromaticity and skin tone but their patterns varied across tasks. The current work can provide guidance for virtual rendering based on visual perception of simulated lighting differences.