film camera question for this digital baby :D

[Dew]

well, most of u know im a digital baby and just bought a film camera a couple of weeks ago ... i've learned on digital and have used it for a while

experimenting with my film camera in different light settings ... i thought, "gee, does film have a "white balance" setting" :scratch:

im not sure if it does and how i would handle different light situations: ambient light, fluoresent light :?

if it doesnt have a "white balance" ... how does it handle different light situations ... this has been bugging me for the past 24hrs ... and the hubby's not home right now, so i cant nag him about it

 

[ksmattfish]

Film comes in daylight balance or tungsten balance. Other than that, color cast is controlled by filters. You can buy filters designed to balance the casts of common sources of light, or you can use specific color packs to deal with lighting conditions.

 

[Dew]

wow ... i didnt know that :shock:


i know sometimes i take photographs in the subway with fluouresent light available, on my digital, i change the white balance to about 4700

so when u say "daylight" ... do u mean about 5500-6500 ?? ... can u elaborate on tungsten a little more? ... and what would be a good filter for fluouresent light?

 

[ksmattfish]

There are several different filters for florescent lights, because there are different kinds of florescent lights. The most common is a FLD filter; it looks slightly magenta. I don't know what temp florescent lights are considered to be at; because they are also emitting light influenced by the excited gas, and I don't think this fits neatly into the color temp scale.

Daylight is about 5500. Electronic flash is usually 6000 - 6500.

Tungsten balanced film is mostly only available in E6 (slides). It is designed to counter the orange cast from photo floods on a copy stand. There are actually two slightly different kinds of photo floods, both at slightly different color temps (like 3200 and 3400, or something). There are also filters (blue) for each of these kinds of photo floods for using with daylight balanced film. Photo floods are like super, high power household bulbs. Regular household bulbs are a much lower color temp. If you shoot tungsten balanced E6 in normal daylight, it will come out blue.

 

[Kent Frost]

Well, I was going to use my intro as my first post, but this one just had to be jumped on. lol

With colored filters, it's almost best to think of light in terms of opposites to help in understanding which way to move on the spectrum when choosing a filter to do any color correction while shooting....and as an example, it's easiest (at first [at least to me]) to think in terms of black and white film:

Let's say you're shooting a picture (BW) of a model. Fairly simple shot, but you want to make the red lipstick on the model stand out more. In BW photography, to do this, you have to imagine what will happen depending on what color filter you choose. Even though the color of the filter will have no effect on the actual "color" of the BW image, the values WILL be affected.
Let's say you use no filter whatsoever for this shot....you'll probably get a moderate grayscale image. But, let's say you use a red filter. Well, since the lipstick is red and the filter filters out red, you'd end up with what appears to be a set of white lips. Okay, well that's not the effect we were after, because now your model looks like a corpse. We want to make the lipstick stand out more.....so what's on the opposite end of the color spectrum from red? GREEN. The green filter will make the red lipstick appear almost black.

Okay, so how does this relate when using color film? Well, you have to imagine what happens with color film when you're in certain types of lighting, just as ksmattfish mentioned.
If you're using regular color film, it's typically balanced for daylight color. When you go inside, where most of us have regular incandescent bulbs (household lightbulbs), things suddenly take on a much warmer appearance...the color is being shifted to the redder side of the spectrum. Actually appearing mostly kind of an orange tone. To fix this, you have to move back towards the cooler side of the spectrum. So to balance the color back from red, you have to use a lightly green-tinted filter to shift it all back to the zero point (daylight color).
Now, what if you're in florescent lighting? Well assuming they're not daylight balanced, this will give a greenish tint to your pictures (to me this gives the image a sickly feel). So this time, to balance from the green color of the florescent lights, you'll have to use a warming filter that leans back towards the red side of the spectrum.
With tungsten lights (which are common in high school basketball gymnasiums), the image becomes very orange. This would require a tungsten filter, which takes on a bluish tint.
And also typical in gyms are mercury vapor lights, which have a tendency to make your images somewhat blue, I believe. I can't remember fully on this one, but I think you would just follow the reversed step you would take for tungsten to fix this one...which would be a slightly orangish filter.

 

[ksmattfish]

Old flourecent lights always had a green cast. There are several different kinds of flourecent lights out theses days, each claims to be more light normal white light. All have a fun color cast for photographers to deal with, but they aren't all green.

I don't think that flouresent lights fit on the normal color temp scale, as the color cast is a result of electrified gas. The color temp scale is based on an object (like a steel bar) heating up: red hot, orange, yellow, white, blue.

Mercury vapor lights always add a green cast to my photos.

Sodium lights add a yellow cast.

 

[voodoocat]

So to balance the color back from red, you have to use a lightly green-tinted filter to shift it all back to the zero point (daylight color).

Incandescent light gives off more of a yellow/orange. That is why a filter to correct this is blue. An 80A. I don't know that i've ever heard about using a green filter to correct tungsten lighting.

 

[Dew]

im looking into a blue filter, i think its most likely to suit my needs on b&w film (B+W blue 080 glass filter) ... thanks for all the info

... it brings up some questions for me in the "digital v/s film" war (i have both) ... its amazing that filters are needed for many lighting situations .. i argued with the hubby this morning and said, "i can shoot my digital camera in RAW mode right now and get the two colors of this room dead on (with 96% accuratcy of colors) without a filter in sight!" ...

which confuses me a little further ... everytime someone speaks of RAW mode on digital cameras, they say, "thats the closest to film" ... but with film ... the mood changes depending on what filter is used or not used ... but thats another topic

thanks guys ... if u'd like to elaborate further, please continue :roll:

 

[voodoocat]

I don't use filters for the most part to fix light with film. I don't like losing the light. I'll just do it in photoshop. pretty much what your digital camera does. using software.

you don't need an 80a filter to correct black and white film. The color temperature doesn't really affect black and white.

 

[Dew]

the hubby's laughing at me right now .. he says, "i'll give u another 2 months and u will put that film camera in the closet ... between filters and orange color cast on the negs"

on my digital cam shooting in RAW mode ... i get 96% accuracy (or more) of colors straight out the camera without the use of photoshop ...

to be honest ... i've just developed a new respect for my digital camera ... i will continue to use it "professionally" .... and play around with my film camera ... just for kicks

anybody want to buy a Canon Rebel? ... just kiddin ... or am i? :roll:

 

[voodoocat]

on my digital cam shooting in RAW mode ... i get 96% accuracy (or more) of colors straight out the camera without the use of photoshop ...

I'm not saying that you were using photoshop. It's white balance. All RAW is, is an uncompressed image. It includes a larger spectrum of colors than a compressed file. The fact remains, though, that incandescent bulbs emit a light that is yellow/orangish. Our eyes don't really see that like film or a sensor does.

 

[voodoocat]

here is from another page I found about RAW:

A RAW file suffers from none of these limitations since the DSLR does not apply any of the shooting parameters to the RAW image in the buffer. Instead, like two young friends skipping hand in hand through a hay field, the RAW image and its shooting parameters are kept apart until they meet at the RAW conversion stage. This means that changes can be made to the exposure (brightness and contrast), white balance, saturation, sharpness and many other parameters using the RAW image data from the DSLR. These changes take place on RAW data that has a much (arguably 50%) greater tonal range (colour information) than an 8 bit JPEG.

So basically there is still software that does a white balance for you.


The reason filters are generally used in film is because the main way to print them is straight from the negative. If it's balanced for daylight and you have tungsten lighting it's going to be yellow/orange. But I actually scan my negatives and slides so that I can change that and then print from the digital file.

 

[Dew]

i will play around with b&w film (which was my intention in the beginning) ..... but im at a crossroads right now about film (the hubby revealed some things to me last night as well that i dont find very flattering about my new film venture) :? ...

i just told the hubby to call off buying this pricey high end neg scanner and just get a "moderatly" priced one ... i dont want to invest a fortune ... i told him to buy new memory cards instead

for my needs, im on the right track ... digital will be my future in the world of photography .. film will be a personal hobby ... thanks again guys for your enlightment

 

[Kent Frost]

Incandescent light gives off more of a yellow/orange. That is why a filter to correct this is blue. An 80A. I don't know that i've ever heard about using a green filter to correct tungsten lighting.

With tungsten lights (which are common in high school basketball gymnasiums), the image becomes very orange. This would require a tungsten filter, which takes on a bluish tint.

I never have either. ;-)
And yes, you are correct on the incandescent lighting. 80A filters are wonderful. Not sure why I said green. lol

 

[voodoocat]

Probably cause you were using green in your example for black and white