what do you use for white balance correction?

[shingfan]

when it comes to white balance adjustment....what do you mostly use? (assuming shooting in RAW format)

1) grey card
2) white reference in the image
3) careless, adjust temperature with bare eyes when processing the RAW

i've seen many products for adjusting white balance.....is hard to determine which to get........and it seems that the new ones all have grey+white+black in one card...so that when the white balance is correct....you would see 3 distinct sections on the histogram.....is this better then just pure grey?....or not as good?....

 

[Big Mike]

Do you want perfectly accurate WB? If so...is it really important?

I shoot in RAW and adjust to taste. If I think that it would look good a little warmer, then that's what I do.

 

[Naicidrac]

I have been metering off of a gray card and then shooting. I also have been placing a gray card under the subjects light and then using the camera raw editor in CS2. Then I just photoshop out the gray card.

 

[Arch]

yea personally i dont care if its too a tad bit cold or warm when i take it... i sort that out when im processing the RAW.

 

[Big Mike]

If you are shooting in a studio atmosphere (using the same light repeatedly)...then you can just shoot the grey/white card at the start. Then in post processing, you can set the WB from that one shot and apply that setting to all of the other shots. Most software should allow you to automatically apply that setting to a batch of images.

 

[shingfan]

Do you want perfectly accurate WB? If so...is it really important?

I shoot in RAW and adjust to taste. If I think that it would look good a little warmer, then that's what I do.

well.....i dont really need perfect accurate white balance......but what i would like is that i can adjust the image to almost accurate white balance...and then if i want warmer/colder....i can adjust from the ideal point.........because if i dont have an ideal white point to start with.....i cant tell if there is color cast at a glance until the photo is printed and will be too late (or lazy) to do readjustment.....

 

[ksmattfish]

I shoot raw, then in ACR I use the white balance dropper on something I think is neutral, and adjust to taste from there. I find that my 20D seems to want to run a bit warm yellow.

 

[burtharrris]

ACR? Adobe Camera Raw? Is that a supplemental program for CS2?

 

[JIP]

I have never use it but I hear the expodisc is a good thing to get accurate white balance readings for most situations.

http://www.expodisc.com/index.php

 

[Alex_B]

normally you can adjust white balance just in the raw converter, either using some white area in the image as a reference ... then you might loose a lot of the mood of the image though, if the ambient light had a strong colour cast, e.g. at sunrise or sunset.
... or as I do it most of the time, just using my calibrated screen and my eyes

greycards come in handy whenever you need the exact real colour, such as in product photography, or sometimes wheny it comes to skin tones.

 

[fmw]

I repeat from the last time you posted this, do your white balance in the post process. Much better than doing it in the camera.

 

[usayit]

I repeat from the last time you posted this, do your white balance in the post process. Much better than doing it in the camera.

So in this case, there is no harm with leaving the camera in auto white balance. Correct?

I generally shoot a grey card and set my auto white balance there.... but usually do final adjustments in post process.

 

[shingfan]

i'm currently using NIkon Capture NX to process the RAW files....it seems that the "auto calculated" white balance in the software provides a pretty good white balance adjustment......maybe a little over worried about getting the color right?

btw....when it comes to adjusting white balance....are you only adjusting the temperature?.....or you also adjust the levels as well?....because when i adjust white balance with a grey point in photoshop CS2.....it affects the temperature as well as other levels suchs as saturation, hue, contrast, and brightness......but when i adjust it in nikon capture NX.....i can only see the temperature being adjusted.....maybe other levels are being adjusted at the same time as well just that i'm not seeing it.....anyone know what the software does when you adjust the white balance (with a grey point?)?

 

[Alex_B]

So in this case, there is no harm with leaving the camera in auto white balance. Correct?

if you shoot raw and do the WB in your RAW converter, then the WB you set on the camera is absolutely meaningless.

I do not even know what my camera'S WB is set to all the time

 

[pulpmojo]

I was using a gray card to manually set the white mbalance in my camera, but I've found that using something white tends to give me better results, not to mention it's one less thing I need to carry to a shoot.