White Balance / Gray Card and Landscape Photography

[kundalini]

I'll use a grey card for people shots and a few other things, then set my WB in camera to 5000K because more than likely I will be using some form of flash. It's a starting point.

For landscapes I'll usually set the WB to 6500K. I like the warmth unless it's a grey/blue day and I wish to show this.

I don't have a problem with using Auto WB either.

 

[Robin Usagani]

Yeah.. I dont care about setting WB. The only time I worry about WB is when I shoot with JPG or when I shoot videos. When you said DEAD ON, who will be the judge? Also, if we talk about skin color, who will judge if it is the right skin tone? Most of the time people with darker skin is happier when they are lighter on the photo. Same thing with people with fair skin, they wouldnt mind if they are a little darker.

Lets say you have a white wedding dress and the sun light hits the dress. Do you think part of the dress got hit by the sun should be white or a little yellow? I think it should be a little yellow, what do you think?

 

[unpopular]

What time of day (more important, what type of shadows)? If it's mid morning/early afternoon, I'd say a neutral to even very slightly cyan. If it's mid afternoon to evening, I'd agree, slightly warm.

My problem with "dead on" is that often it doesn't even make sense. While our eyes do adjust, they don't adjust linearly nor completely. We may not notice a color cast until it's missing.

 

[jamesbjenkins]

It's pretty simple. If you're in the studio, you should already have a WB preset for your strobes. If you're on location, and WB is important, snap a shot of the grey card and set it in post later. If you're on location, and WB isn't terribly important to nail, then just play with the slider until it looks right, then probably bump it another 100K just for the sake of warmth.

Anything beyond that, and you're thinking too much, and shooting too little.

And while you're at it, you should probably be using a "quad card" so you can set the white and black points too...

 

[charlie76]

As long as the histogram has the picture properly exposed, I do everything post processing. I agree with both posts above me.

What exactly are you looking for on your histogram? All pictures seem to have different optimal histograms

 

[charlie76]

There was a time when you pretty much had to pick between two white balances - 5000K and around 3000K. While sure, you had CC filters, to really make use of them you;d need a $1,000+ color meter. Very few used them, even fewer would have used them for landscapes.

Now that you can dial-o-filter, people get all worked up over white balance and color temperatures.

I just pretty much shoot everything at 5000K or 3000K just so I can get a remotely accurate histogram, and as mike says, adjust it later.

"dial-o-filter"..? Does that mean you can create different filter effects by adjusting white balance and/or other settings?

 

[unpopular]

When you did color corrections with film, you would ideally use an optical filter to compensate for changes in color temperature and white balance. You'd have a set of filters, meter the color temperature and calculate which filter to use with the film type. You had two film types, "daylight" and "tungsten".

Today you can just dial that color correction in. Of course, it's applied post exposure - but we'll just pretend it's non-destructive, so, for the time being, no need for CC filters.

 

[fjrabon]

There was a time when you pretty much had to pick between two white balances - 5000K and around 3000K. While sure, you had CC filters, to really make use of them you;d need a $1,000+ color meter. Very few used them, even fewer would have used them for landscapes.

Now that you can dial-o-filter, people get all worked up over white balance and color temperatures.

I just pretty much shoot everything at 5000K or 3000K just so I can get a remotely accurate histogram, and as mike says, adjust it later.

"dial-o-filter"..? Does that mean you can create different filter effects by adjusting white balance and/or other settings?

It used to be that you needed C(olor) C (orrection) filters to fine tune white balance.

In some sense it's a 'filter effect' that we can change our white balances down to the degree. Most people today don't think of it that way, because they never shot in the days when it wasn't that way.

 

[charlie76]

It used to be that you needed C(olor) C (orrection) filters to fine tune white balance.

In some sense it's a 'filter effect' that we can change our white balances down to the degree. Most people today don't think of it that way, because they never shot in the days when it wasn't that way.

I see

 

[Divemaster]

No. It's not unheard of, I'm not saying that. I'd probably use one for a portrait, but only as a starting point.

It's more the "dead on" line. There is plenty of room in portraits to work with and still remain natural, you're not bound to neutral color cast, no matter what race the model is.

I really don't get what point you're trying to make. My point was that certain types of photography, white balance is important enough that you probably need a grey card. How strictly you want to interpret 'dead on' to mean is kind of a really unimportant side point. It's like arguing how sharp is sharp enough and how sharp is too much.

I can tell you I've had agents, when I first started doing real estate, who would tell me that I made the shade of paint eggshell, when it should have been off white. I can tell you I've done portraits where trying to get the skin tones right off memory didn't go so well. That was my only point.

Also, I apologize to the OP for hijacking the thread, I have no idea how unpopular always manages to drag things into completely unimportant tangential arguments.

No worries, I got a little bit more of an education out of all of this!

Thanks for your input!!