Copying white balance from a pre-existing photograph

[Kaliuzhkin]

After 10 years of using a Nikon D300 camera with Auto white balance, I'm now starting to pay more attention to White Balance. I bought a WhiBal Studio card (3.5" x 6"). For post-processing, I use Corel PaintShop Pro X8. I would consider Corel AfterShot Pro 3, Nikon routines Capture NX-D, ViewNX-I, View NX 2 and Capture NX-D. I have Nikon NEF Codec. I haven’t got the hang of these Nikon routines. For example, how do I crop?

I avoid Adobe products because of the cost and the subscription model.

I’m successful with using Direct Measurement to make the adjustment with the camera as I take the pictures. I light the grey card, measure it, and select the measurement.

However, I have some questions about copying white balance from a pre-existing reference photo. That white balance coupling can be done with the camera or with the post-processing software.

When I take the reference picture of the grey card, doesn’t that picture already have white balance adjustments? It seems that using it as a reference would introduce two cumulative adjustments. So how do I take the reference picture of the grey card?

Another way to use the reference picture is to determine its color temperature and enter that as data. That, too, can be done with the camera or with post-processing software. But how do I determine the color temperature? Does one number, the color temperature, fully describe the white balance? How do I find that number?

Dan

 

[bratkinson]

As a hobby photographer, I've given up on using a Whibal card, Color Checker and even Expo Disk (I've used all 3) trying to get the white balance 'right' in the camera (or computer, with the Color Checker). The reason is simple...as I shoot mostly hand held, the lighting source from one shot to the next may likely be different, even just a little, than the lighting in the previous shot.

While outdoors on sunny or mostly sunny days will have a very consistent white balance as long as the subjects are all in the same lighting, no shadows, etc, there's no problem doing a custom white balance 'in camera' using a Whibal card or Expo Disk. But with subjects moving around, changing lighting, dusk/dawn, for example, or indoors, it's a whole new ball game. I shoot a lot a indoor events at church and schools (no weddings!) and lighting is a nightmare! There are areas with large windows, overhead incandescent lights near the doors, and florescent lights further back. At one school stage venue I shoot at once or twice per year, there are spotlights, LED overhead lights at the front of the stage, and incandescent lights at the rear of the stage. And 'concert' setups with multi color lights? Now you know why I'm bald.

So, what I do is to first have a calibrated monitor. For me, Colormunki works well and is easy to use. After that, I use the 'set white balance' eyedropper in Lightroom (Corel and other comparable products should have a similar function) where I simply click on what is just a tad towards beige and set that as my white balance starting point. Then I fine-tune the white balance slider bars to adjust the blue/yellow 'temperature' and green/red 'tint' settings to get what I think is the right white balance. If there's a number of shots where everyone is pretty much in the same location & lighting, I'll use the 'sync' function to copy those settings and any others (blanket settings) I want to apply to the 'set' to the rest of the group, be it 3 frames or 15-20. Of course, while going through those images one at a time, I may decide I want a slightly different WB, so I'll fix that one and 'sync' it back to the others. As I haven't sufficiently mastered the 'sync' function, I sometimes write down the 2 WB numbers next to the sliders and go to each frame and type those in to achieve identical WB between that group of images. And for the times where the lighting is screwy across the stage or room, I get the faces of the main subject(s) 'right', and let the others come out in various non-flesh-color hues. I have Photoshop Elements as well, but my skills at that to 'extract' just one face and get the colors right and put it back are still in the 'takes an hour for what should be 1 minute to do' category. I simply don't get enough practice or have the time to make that level of adjustments in a shoot with 100-200 'keepers'.

And like the OP, I refuse to use the 'pay as you go' plan with Adobe. I the 'installed' version of each that I can use and only upgrade when I have to.