A few questions about white balance

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D-pearce92

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I was told on my last thread to set the custom white balance but dont really understand it. My questions are below?

What does it do?

Can you use your hand to set the WB?

If you go to a racing circuit and at first your shooting in the sun you would set the white balance then you move to a shady area would you set it again?

Has anyone got a video of a step by step guide to setting the custom white balance on a 20D as i've tried following the manual but am getting abit stuck?

Many thanks for helping Dex
 
D-pearce92 said:
I was told on my last thread to set the custom white balance but dont really understand it. My questions are below?

What does it do?
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The colour of an object changes with the colour of the light falling on it, which varies a lot. Daylight/flash is bluish, tungsten bulbs are yellow/orange, fluorescent tubes tend to be greenish. The eye/brain corrects it automatically, but the camera needs help.

Can you use your hand to set the WB?
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No. You can sometimes use it for exposure setting, if you know what you're doing.


If you go to a racing circuit and at first your shooting in the sun you would set the white balance then you move to a shady area would you set it again?
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Ideally, yes. Though the difference between sun and shade is not usually massive. If you post process, you can correct the colour then. If you shoot Raw, there is more scope for doing that, amongst other things.

Has anyone got a video of a step by step guide to setting the custom white balance on a 20D as i've tried following the manual but am getting abit stuck?

Many thanks for helping Dex
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You really don't need a video. Shoot a neutral white target (card, paper, envelope, whatever). Make sure it covers the centre circle and that it is illuminated by the same light that is falling on the subject. So long as it's not massively over exposed (ie blown) or dramatically under exposed (full of noise) it will be fine.

Go to custom white balance and it will ask you if you want to use that image for CWB. Yes. Then select CWB and you're good to go. Most of the time you'll find the pre-set white balance options (sun, shade, flash etc) are pretty good.

If you have live view, use that and then switch on the white balance options and scroll through. You can see the colour change on the LCD.
 
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I always shoot Raw

Thanks for the answers Richard. The way you've described it is alot easier to understand than the manual for setting custom white balance. By the centre circle do you mean the autofocus points?
 
Does anyone actually set manual wb.I have always used auto wb unless your in very controlled lighting situations.
 
I always use manual WB for underwater shooting, saves SO much PP'ing.
 
starletman said:
Does anyone actually set manual wb.I have always used auto wb unless your in very controlled lighting situations.
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Of course. AWB is hopeless in most artificial light.

Try AWB in tungsten light, then an identical shot with the tungsten pre-set, and a third with a custom WB. First shot will be poor, second probably be quite good, third shot good.

Do the same in fluorescent light. First shot will be poor, second shot might not be much better, third shot will be good.
 
If you're shooting RAW, AWB is fine as you can fully adjust WB in post with no loss of quality.

Even shooting jpeg, you can make some WB adjustments by opening the Jpeg `as RAW`, so don't panic if you shoot at the wrong setting - all is not lost:naughty:

If in doubt, stick to AWB.
 
I always set my wb to Sunny as that is approx 5200 and to my eye neutral. As I shot raw if there are and changes To ne made I can do this back home on ps.
 
personally i just set auto white balance and always shoot RAW...can fiddle with wb if necessary in lightroom after that.
 
So the general theme from most people is... shoot badly.. get the pictures all wrong.. then fix later ? this is what we want to teach in talk basics is it?

given the question asked by the OP i think setting own exposure as apposed to white balance is whats being asked..

however..

Shoot in a sports hall or swimming pool or any number of indoor places with dodgy lighting..take a picture and your whole scene can (for example) look orange.

under these lights look for something white.. an advertising board or a sheet of paper.. anything that will fill your screen with a white area under the lighting.. take a picture of this white area..

now use your camera settings (so many diff cameras i cant list them all) to register that picture as white.. all subsequent pics will have the colours changed taking into consideration the white you registered.. which was probably bluish or orangish.., whatever the camera has to do to amke that white will also effect all other colours..

its not always pefect but makes a massive change... the following pics i took at a basketball match.... pre setting white balance and post setting white balance

wb.jpg


Like anyhting else its simple when you know how.. for me shooting raw at basketball is a non starter.. but not only that.. why would i want to shoot them all orange and fix later when i can use the camera settings to shoot it right in the first place?

Sorry but telling people to shoot badly and fix later is very bad advice IMHO
 
KIPAX said:
So the general theme from most people is... shoot badly.. get the pictures all wrong.. then fix later ? this is what we want to teach in talk basics is it?

given the question asked by the OP i think setting own exposure as apposed to white balance is whats being asked..

however..

Shoot in a sports hall or swimming pool or any number of indoor places with dodgy lighting..take a picture and your whole scene can (for example) look orange.

under these lights look for something white.. an advertising board or a sheet of paper.. anything that will fill your screen with a white area under the lighting.. take a picture of this white area..

now use your camera settings (so many diff cameras i cant list them all) to register that picture as white.. all subsequent pics will have the colours changed taking into consideration the white you registered.. which was probably bluish or orangish.., whatever the camera has to do to amke that white will also effect all other colours..

its not always pefect but makes a massive change... the following pics i took at a basketball match.... pre setting white balance and post setting white balance

Like anyhting else its simple when you know how.. for me shooting raw at basketball is a non starter.. but not only that.. why would i want to shoot them all orange and fix later when i can use the camera settings to shoot it right in the first place?

Sorry but telling people to shoot badly and fix later is very bad advice IMHO
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Not sure anyone actually said to shoot badly. If shooting jpg custom white balance is a must IMO. If shooting RAW choosing a preset that's close enough will get you by, easier in post if you take a shot of a grey card in that light. If I have time I shoot the xrite colour passport and not only for white balance, but to create a custom camera calibration for all colours under those lighting conditions. But at say a wedding, I usually choose cloudy or tungsten so its consistent and batch correct in post.
 
lensflair said:
Not sure anyone actually said to shoot badly..
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Far so many people to say dont set WB .. shoot in raw and fix later... That reads to me as shoot badly fix later.. doesn't it to you?
 
I see where you’re coming from Tony and I think there may be a shade of grey here (pardon the pun :lol: )

Being ignorant to the effects of different light sources and the colours they can cast on images is one thing, knowing this and either getting “near” to a good image in camera or shooting in RAW and leaving WB until PP, IMO is another.

I took a little wander out on Saturday to get some shots of my local team playing (when I say a little wander I mean about 75 yards :lol: ), it was reasonably bright and the sun was making the odd appearance. Setting a custom white balance wasn’t going to do me that much good and I didn’t really want to be switching between the sunny/cloudy presets and tbh, a lot of the shots might have been somewhere in between.

I also find it very difficult to assess the effects of WB when the difference is marginal on the camera’s screen so I made a conscious decision to leave the camera in AWB, shoot in RAW and to make amendments in LR after.

As it happens, the camera did a pretty decent job and the images only needed a very slight tweak (which I did in “batch”). Having said that, if you saw the photos on my Facebook you might have a different opinion :lol:

I completely understand that from your perspective, you don’t necessarily have time (or inclination) to go through hundreds of shots after each game/event you cover. If I know the light’s going to be consistent then I do make more of an effort to get it right at the time of shooting and I guess one of the many reasons you’re a pro and I’m not is that you can make these marginal assessments and adjustments a lot better than me ;)
 
I shoot in RAW all the time and still set a manual WB about 98% of the time.
 
Decent article here:

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/white-balance.htm

"By far the best white balance solution is to photograph using the RAW file format (if your camera supports them), as these allow you to set the WB *after* the photo has been taken. RAW files also allow one to set the WB based on a broader range of color temperature and green-magenta shifts.

Performing a white balance with a raw file is quick and easy. You can either adjust the temperature and green-magenta sliders until color casts are removed, or you can simply click on a neutral reference within the image (see next section). Even if only one of your photos contains a neutral reference, you can click on it and then use the resulting WB settings for the remainder of your photos (assuming the same lighting)."

`Cambridge in Colour` is always worth a look for technical stuff.
 
Some good info in here which as a beginner I didn't really know much about! I need to do some test shots while playing with the WB. Cheers for the info.
 
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