Grey card....

[Robbo]

Only ever used a White card for CWB

How does grey differ? Pros, cons? Do you set it up the same as the White card or is the a different technique to this?

Any help welcome

 

[Scarecrow]

Only con I have heard for using a white card is that it is possible to overexpose it and blow out one of the colour channels, giving you an incorrect reading. I think it's for that reason that people will advocate using a grey card.

 

[Robbo]

ahh ok makes sense.

How do you set it up? same as CWB in the camera? confused to how the camera knows the difference between knowing if its white or grey....or am I missing something here?

I have read a technique where you sample the grey card in PP and apply that to all your pictures (using RAW)

 

[onform]

ahh ok makes sense.

How do you set it up? same as CWB in the camera? confused to how the camera knows the difference between knowing if its white or grey....or am I missing something here?

I have read a technique where you sample the grey card in PP and apply that to all your pictures (using RAW)

If your going to do it that way have a half grey half white card you can accurately set the WB and exposure then. Use it in your first shot and as long as the lighting conditions don't change the jobs a goodun.

 

[HoppyUK]

You can use any neutral tone for white balance - white, light grey, dark grey, whatever - so long as it's perfectly neutral with equal quantities of red, green and blue.

And so long as you don't over expose it (blown channels) or under exposure it too much (lots of noise) the result should be the same.

That will sort out your JPEGs, and as mentioned, if you want to correct Raws in post processing, then include the neutral card in one of the images and reference that with the dropper.

Bear in mind that that technically dead accurate white balance is rarely needed and sometimes doesn't look right - you wouldn't want to neutralise a sunset for example, or candle light etc, to cite an extreme. It's usually more important to get consistent colour if you are shooting a lot of pictures of the same thing, than for it to be 100% accurate. AWB is notoriously inconsistent, but I find the pre-sets are usually pretty good for most things. For bounce flash though off a non-white surface, a custom white balance (or card in frame shot) is really the only way.

 

[Robbo]

Thanks for the replies.

It's mainly going to be used in my studio set up for portraits, been using White in the CWB in camera etc but thought I would try a grey and raw PP style to see how it compares.

Have ordered a 18% grey and White lastolite 30cm see how it goes.

 

[onform]

TBH your camera has a flash setting in the WB menu....use it. I would be very surprised if it turns out wrong.

 

[Robbo]

Are you joking?

If it was that good why would they include a custom wb function for a start.

How would I go around in a room win natural light, tungsten light, and studio kit all in one image, what temperature would that be set at.

The reason I am wanting as near as possible as the pictures are for clients, so a 'it will do' won't cut it tbh.

Ask any pro and see how many use the flash wb during a shoot.

 

[String]

Are you joking?

If it was that good why would they include a custom wb function for a start.

How would I go around in a room win natural light, tungsten light, and studio kit all in one image, what temperature would that be set at.

The reason I am wanting as near as possible as the pictures are for clients, so a 'it will do' won't cut it tbh.

Ask any pro and see how many use the flash wb during a shoot.

Why a custom WB? well, for example, if you are using a grey ND filter and its throwing a cast, it's easy to use cwb to rid yourself of the cast. Also it can be helpful when using mixed lighting. Usually the standard WB settings are on the money

 

[HoppyUK]

Are you joking?

If it was that good why would they include a custom wb function for a start.

How would I go around in a room win natural light, tungsten light, and studio kit all in one image, what temperature would that be set at.

The reason I am wanting as near as possible as the pictures are for clients, so a 'it will do' won't cut it tbh.

Ask any pro and see how many use the flash wb during a shoot.

If you've got multiple coloured light sources in one shot, then you're stuffed. You can only correct for one - go for the main subject - and you can't do anything further about it in post processing.

Fortunately, you rarely get more than two - usually flash and tungsten room light. Then you should gel the flash with a CTO, and set the white balance to tungsten. Fluorescent light can be unpredictable - it's usually greenish, but hard to judge.

 

[MC_Stoo]

 

[Robbo]

Where did you get them cards from?

 

[MC_Stoo]

Where did you get them cards from?

Linky, although there are plenty of other brands that do the same job

 

[JonathanRyan]

If it was that good why would they include a custom wb function for a start.

For mixed ambient (no flash) for one thing. Plus it's easy and cheap and every other manu does it so every manu has to do it

How would I go around in a room win natural light, tungsten light, and studio kit all in one image, what temperature would that be set at.

B&W? Seriously I wouldn't ever do that. I can't imagine why you'd want to.

Turn up the flash and kill the ambient.

The reason I am wanting as near as possible as the pictures are for clients, so a 'it will do' won't cut it tbh.

20% of white men are colour blind. There's more latitude than you think

Ask any pro and see how many use the flash wb during a shoot.

Um, one that I know of (including me) Flash or more often 5200K. Reference frame of a colour checker and adjust in post but the previews are really close enough and I don't adjust them by much in post.

 

[Robbo]

Thanks for your replies.

I just want to point out the most of my original reply was in sarcasm lol but thank you for taking the time for good replies, always appreciated.

My down fall is I am a total obsessed perfectionist, if there is a way to make or do something a tiny bit better, even if no one else might notice, I still do it, is that classed as OCD? Obviously within my money limits lol

 

[The23rdman]

Thanks for your replies.

I just want to point out the most of my original reply was in sarcasm lol but thank you for taking the time for good replies, always appreciated.

My down fall is I am a total obsessed perfectionist, if there is a way to make or do something a tiny bit better, even if no one else might notice, I still do it, is that classed as OCD? Obviously within my money limits lol

I'm OOO, which is like OCD, but a lot neater.

 

[swanseamale47]

TBH your camera has a flash setting in the WB menu....use it. I would be very surprised if it turns out wrong.

This might be pretty good with the on camera flash but studio flash will vary from make to make, thats without taking into account reflectance of colour from the room itself (not all rooms are perfectly white), many schools for examply will have green or beige walls.

 

[JonathanRyan]

>> My down fall is I am a total obsessed perfectionist, if there is a way to make or do something a tiny bit better, even if no one else might notice, I still do it

Then don't get a grey card - get a proper colour checker.

On the left is as shot. White balance set to "flash" which Hasselblad interpret as 5500 and 0 tint. On the right I corrected the whibal using the grey patches on the colour checker which made it 6150 and +16 tint. However, first I built a custom camera profile for this particular light setup, camera and lens combination. The differences with this vs a canned profile are extremely subtle and tend to show up in the reds (differences are much more noticeable with my Nikons). Her hair shifts a tiny bit but nothing you'd really notice.

[Note, I absolutely haven't changed any part of the exposure - the shift in the dress and b/g is entirely due to colour calibration]

BUT....I still maintain the pic on the left is adequate for 90% of work and entirely suitable for client preview on an uncalibrated laptop.....

 

[Robbo]

Ah good example.

So would a colour checker be the best bet out of the above mentioned?

I realise there will still only be slight adjustments, buts it's something I think would be worth having and using on certain shots etc

 

[onform]

Thanks for the replies.

It's mainly going to be used in my studio set up for portraits, been using White in the CWB in camera etc but thought I would try a grey and raw PP style to see how it compares.

Have ordered a 18% grey and White lastolite 30cm see how it goes.

Are you joking?

If it was that good why would they include a custom wb function for a start.

How would I go around in a room win natural light, tungsten light, and studio kit all in one image, what temperature would that be set at.

The reason I am wanting as near as possible as the pictures are for clients, so a 'it will do' won't cut it tbh.

Ask any pro and see how many use the flash wb during a shoot.

Your first Quote was the reason for suggesting Flash W/B...

 

[JonathanRyan]

So would a colour checker be the best bet out of the above mentioned?

It's really up to you. They are fairly pricey if you don't need them. (70 quid vs maybe 15 for a decent grey card - https://shop.colourconfidence.com/section.php?xSec=10055&jssCart=4a22f9b87faf200768f1f5cbaec486d9 though they also have a nice grey target built in)

Unless you're doing pretty critical work then thy may be overkill and introduce a step into your workflow you don't need. If you're going to muck about with exposure or tone curve then it's pretty moot - you can make more difference by breathing on the sliders than all the careful colour balancing you like. Plus on some studio lights the colours can bounce all over the place with the smallest change in power.

As I said, i's more obvious on my Nikons. Here's a shot with a D3S. White balance was manually set to 5200. On my screen in Lightroom I can see more shadow detail in the skirt coming from the better red rendition with the custom profile but it's not huge. Possibly on a better monitor it would be more pronounced. Pics below have been rendered into sRGB and end up looking v similar.

Here's how I use one. This is a (very) full day's shooting. 3 "looks" and a little buggering about with lights (one of the Elys stopped firing and I had to swap it for another head). I needed to be sure that dresses were pretty much the right colour and that the colours were consistent from first to last so they would work for client's needs.

 

[Robbo]

Thanks for that info, maybe for that price it would be a bit over kill for me at the moment. Think I will get the cards or now and see where things lead me.

thanks for all the help!