Do you ever use Auto White Balance?

[JimmyO]

I'm looking on dpreview.com (I know, I know), and they were showing the ability (or lack thereof) of certain cameras to adjust in their auto setting. Most of them don't do very well, leaving the images horribly warm in their auto detection. But that's some chart, not reality, and a camera is not a piece of science to be used in some lab.

So, does anyone use Auto WB when taking a photo? If so, do you see a problem with the balance on it when you're shooting? I forget to change mine a lot, so I like the idea of Auto WB, but it seems I might be shooting myself in the foot if I make a habit out of this.

Any experience with this is greatly appreciated.

When I'm doing random shots and dont really wanna think about the shots i just through it in AWB, but if i know im shooting in one standard location for a while i set it to my liking.

 

[brileyphotog]

I shoot Auto WB until it messes up...which on modern DSLRs isn't too often. As far as shooting RAW just to adjust the WB...I have no idea why you would do that. I like RAW for tricky exposures because it offers more dynamic range and you can salvage wrong exposures without getting crazy noise.

Considering that all you have to do to shoot raw is change one setting in the menu if you have a decent camera, it definitely doesn't make you L337

My favorite thing ever was talking to a guy who was shooting with a fairly nice Canon from the stands at a football game. He was talking a big game about RAW and then we switched cameras to check 'em out and I noticed he had it set to auto everything!

 

[Jon0807]

I shoot in AWB and I shoot in RAW. How is that bragging? I'd rather brag about my enormous e-penis!

 

[asfixiate]

nice dog. Bullmastiff?

 

[Jon0807]

yeah he 5 years old and still acts like a puppy lol

 

[Village Idiot]

Just have to laugh at everyone bragging about how they shoot RAW so it's no big deal.

I can only shoot JPEG, and I can still adjust WB in a graphics editor.

Why is "I shoot RAW" such an e-penis enlarger in this forum?

Upset because you still have just a P&S?

 

[Jamesy]

auto all the way.

I SHOOT RAW SO I CAN CHANGE IT IN POST. ..lol

 

[jbushee]

I'm new, so hopefully this isn't too dumb, but I see everyone referring to shooting RAW to allow editing the WB.

Can't you shoot JPG, and open in Camera RAW to edit the WB too (given that there is some loss of pixel data)??

Thanks
Joe

 

[andrew99]

I'm new, so hopefully this isn't too dumb, but I see everyone referring to shooting RAW to allow editing the WB.

Can't you shoot JPG, and open in Camera RAW to edit the WB too (given that there is some loss of pixel data)??

Thanks
Joe

I do this all the time, and I've mentioned it a few times on this forum, but people keep telling me I can't do it, or it's not possible. Whether I load a JPEG or a RAW file into the Camera Raw program, the sliders are the same!

 

[jbushee]

Thanks!
I keep switching back and forth- RAW, JPG.

I'm JPG now, mostly because I don't like having to open Bridge to preview them.

jb

 

[andrew99]

Thanks!
I keep switching back and forth- RAW, JPG.

I'm JPG now, mostly because I don't like having to open Bridge to preview them.

jb

Actually, despite what I said before, I do shoot RAW mostly. I think it doesn't matter for WB, either format can be fixed exactly the same way in Camera RAW, but for correcting exposure, RAW is better. JPEG compression does throw away data (it has too, otherwise the files wouldn't be smaller ). RAW keeps all the data, so you can bring out details that were otherwise invisible (particularly in the shadows, I find).

 

[bhop]

Always Auto White Balance.

I SHOOT RAW!!!!!!!!!

 

[King Mango]

(it has too, otherwise the files wouldn't be smaller ).

File size, in and of itself, is not an indicator of lost data. Many filetypes can be converted to something else much smaller with mathematically lossless results.
PNG is smaller than tif, for example with images, rar is typically smaller than zip, wma smaller than cda... There's a lot really.

What about us point and shoot guys who can shoot .tif. Is that worth it over Jpg? I haven't noticed yet, but I'd hate to get into a position where it might and not have it. But my camera stores a tif AND a jpg when I set to tif so it becomes not only slow, but adds unnecessary MB.

Oh and I always shoot auto wb and maybe filters would help, but I almost always get blown highlights. So I shoot at a negative EV most of the time although I may set to daylight for a while just to experiment.

 

[Mystwalker]

ooops ... am I the only one who uses the "sunlight", "flash", "overcast", etc ... WB modes?

I hear "Grey Card" term often. Is this an actual "grey piece of paper" which I use to manual set WB? It being white balance, I was expecting it to be "white card"?

 

[andrew99]

File size, in and of itself, is not an indicator of lost data. Many filetypes can be converted to something else much smaller with mathematically lossless results.
PNG is smaller than tif, for example with images, rar is typically smaller than zip, wma smaller than cda... There's a lot really.

I understand what you're saying, and maybe you're right -- but I suspect (although not 100% sure), that RAW files are compressed (although in a lossless way). My D40 is 6MP, and the RAW files are around 5-6MB, but if I save as TIF, they are more than double that size. Also I just tried to compress a RAW file with WinZip, and there was almost no savings in size there, so the RAW files must be saved in a pretty efficient manner.

Anyway, even if JPEG's algorithm is much more efficient than RAW's, to go from a 6MB (possibly compressed) RAW file to a 2MB JPEG file, I'm sure some data loss is going on there.