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White Balance - Are you kidding me, do I have to do all this?

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Peter_Chicago said:
So, if I'm shooting pictures in a church, it would be best set it to AUTO or use the White Paper Method?
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You don't shoot in a church if you don't have permission!

So, what have you got against obsessive-compulsive people anyway?

Besides, you didn't say whether it was Protestant or non Protestant church and whether there were stained glass windows in the daytime or plain white walls at night. Are you using flash or candles?

I suggest you loosen up a bit and don't resist having your community organized so much and make a hobby out of White Balance. White balance is fun and helps you feel at ease in the company of elite photographers.

You not only need a gray card to be happy, you need a digital gray card which you can make here:

http://www.leongoodman.com/balance

You have seen a lot of different opinions on this thread, now here is mine. Take it or leave it!

Lovingly,
Leon
;)
--
http://www.leongoodman.com/balance
http://www.leongoodman.com/expose
http://www.leongoodman.com/d70focusnew.html
http://www.pbase.com/photoleon
http://www.leongoodman.com

 
Peter_Chicago said:
So, if I'm shooting pictures in a church, it would be best set it to AUTO or use the White Paper Method?
Click to expand...
Depends. AUTO is a crap shoot. Now, the camera is a pretty good at guessing, so you will probably be OK. But, the reason for these other WB setting options is the same reason the camera has aperture/shutter priority and manual modes -- it gives you more control. You can set all those to AUTO too, and let the camera make it's best guess, or you can take control yourself. The white paper trick is the penultimate in control.

If the church is lit by incandescent, try setting it to tungsten. If it's lit by florescent, set it to one of the florescent modes.

The ultimate in control is to set the camera to RAW (NEF), then take a picture of the white paper. Then do the entire shoot in RAW. Don't worry about the WB setting. When you get home, use ViewNX to adjust the shot of the white paper so that it's white, then apply that same adjustment to the rest of the shoot.
 
I take lots of church photos, and as my subjects usually are brightly colored, I will do an accurate white balance at whatever object I'm photographing. Automatic white balance has never worked well for me with interiors on any of my digital cameras.

For stained glass window shots, I use Daylight white balance.

It gets tricky when I want to record a mood, however. You have to keep some of the light's color.

For outdoor shots I usually keep the camera set at Daylight; this works particularly well when the sun is low on the horizon and at dusk.
 
I use Auto WB except with flash. I have found that with my SB-900/D90, that flash WB works best. I will occasionally set custom WB for low light shooting such as in a church.
--

'A man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on.'
Winston Churchill
 
Forget all the advice and just set your camer to auto WB. It works exceptionally most of the time and for those times it's not to your liking, a tweak or two in PP solves the problem.
 
Plus, whose eyes are considered to be the benchmark in WB? Everybody perceives colour differently so trying to achieve a mathematically perfect value for WB is for technophiles not photographers.
 
this is the easiest solution for me. It's always with me so I don't have to remember to bring a piece of paper or coffee filter or expodisc...etc.

about $7 on ebay. Mennon White Balance Lens cap. Cheap enough to have one for every lens



****************
Nikon D80. Nikon 50mm 1.8, Nikon 28-200, SB600
 
Cookster670 said:
this is the easiest solution for me. It's always with me so I don't have to remember to bring a piece of paper or coffee filter or expodisc...etc.

about $7 on ebay. Mennon White Balance Lens cap. Cheap enough to have one for every lens
Click to expand...
Might want to read through this:

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=448596

If that weren't enough, the problem with lens caps is that you need one for each lens filter size (67mm, 52mm, etc.), so if you have several lenses in your bag, chances are you will be taking along several caps. I too have found the WB results less than charming with over-the-lens solutions of this type. One gray card will do the trick without having to attach and detach additional equipment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Rule of Thirds is meant to be broken, but only 1/3
of the time.



D80/D90 gallery: http://esfotoclix.com
Photo blog: http://esfotoclix.com/blog1
 
Set it to auto and adjust if necessary in your editor.
 
eNo said:
Cookster670 said:
this is the easiest solution for me. It's always with me so I don't have to remember to bring a piece of paper or coffee filter or expodisc...etc.

about $7 on ebay. Mennon White Balance Lens cap. Cheap enough to have one for every lens
Click to expand...
Might want to read through this:

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=448596

If that weren't enough, the problem with lens caps is that you need one for each lens filter size (67mm, 52mm, etc.), so if you have several lenses in your bag, chances are you will be taking along several caps. I too have found the WB results less than charming with over-the-lens solutions of this type. One gray card will do the trick without having to attach and detach additional equipment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Rule of Thirds is meant to be broken, but only 1/3
of the time.



D80/D90 gallery: http://esfotoclix.com
Photo blog: http://esfotoclix.com/blog1
Click to expand...
That's the first negative comment I have read about the mennon, but at that price I can imagine that there could be variance in quality. I had also always expected that there would be a difference between a $7.00 mennon and a $50+ Expodisc. There are plenty of positive comments on the mennon as well.

At the end of the day, i'm not a pro photogrpaher. The results from the mennon are far better than the auto or the preset settings. For me, they get me accurate enough that I don't need to correct in post.

But above all that, it's convenient. You're right i carry multiple lens caps with me. But so what ? it's not as if they take space AND they protect the lens (i don't use filters). I would use a normal lens cap anyway if it wasn't for these. So there is no downside for me here. Furthermore, its convenient. I don't have to think to bring anything with me or carry extra gear in my pocket. I just need to grab my camera and i'm set.

So is it pro quality ? Don't know, probably not, never been an issue for me, but i'm perfectly happy to say that it may not be as good as more expensive solutions...but for me, that's no big deal.

and i can always correct in post if I absolutely have to ;-)
--
****************
Nikon D80. Nikon 50mm 1.8, Nikon 28-200, SB600
 
John Luciani said:
Forget all the advice and just set your camer to auto WB. It works exceptionally most of the time and for those times it's not to your liking, a tweak or two in PP solves the problem.
Click to expand...
That is just another piece of advice and I and many others disagree with it.

--
******************************************************
I have a home on pbase
http://www.pbase.com/claypaws/
If you have the time to look
******************************************************
 
lizzie b said:
John Luciani said:
Plus, whose eyes are considered to be the benchmark in WB? Everybody perceives colour differently so trying to achieve a mathematically perfect value for WB is for technophiles not photographers.
Click to expand...
Well said.
Click to expand...
Yeah, this must be why Michael Freeman (a technophile poser, perhaps?) spends several pages of his lighting book on WB. Please. Of course photographers care about WB.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Rule of Thirds is meant to be broken, but only 1/3
of the time.



D80/D90 gallery: http://esfotoclix.com
Photo blog: http://esfotoclix.com/blog1
 
eNo said:
1. You should only need to do the gray/white card preset under tough mixed lighting conditions,...
Click to expand...
Even worse than that, I guess you'd need two or more white cards in mixed lightning ;) Plus, it would still be a pp nightmare to fix. Well if this mixed lightning is caused by one's own flash it is a better idea to put a gel on it so that it approximatey matches the ambient light (gets even more complicated if part of the flash is direct and part bounced from a coloured ceiling...). Been too lazy to do this a couple of times, and was sorry later.
 
eNo said:
I am working on a short, but hopefully useful article on WB that will come out this Friday (11/06), so you might want to check out my blog then. Among other things it will discuss that it's not always desirable to have "true white."
Click to expand...
As promised, here's the (not so short) article:
http://esfotoclix.com/blog1/?p=847

There will be a follow-up one on "WB actuality" on Monday. Hope this helps.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Rule of Thirds is meant to be broken, but only 1/3
of the time.



D80/D90 gallery: http://esfotoclix.com
Photo blog: http://esfotoclix.com/blog1
 
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