WB Names vs. Degrees K

Kenneth Evans said:

I am confused about the following two white balance issues:

1. By all acounts, including the D100 manual (p. 53), I get the
impression that there is a 1-1 correspondence between the names
used for WB (e.g. Cloudy -3, Flash +2, etc.) and the temperature
(e.g. 6600K, 5000K, respectively).

However, in Capture I get a distinct difference between, say,
Cloudy 6600K and Flash 6600K. That is, if I make a copy of the
image and set the original and the copy to these numbers, the
pictures look quite different. The histograms are different, too.
This indicates there is more to WB than temperature. And sort of
leaves you hanging in regard to choosing a value to use.

2. Suppose I take a picture at, say Cloudy -3. Does what I see in
Capture with either WB Off (Red X) or at Recorded Value (these
appear to be the same) correspond to no WB or to Cloudy -3.

If the latter, when I then set the WB to Cloudy 6600, to what does
this correspond.

If not, what do I do in Capture to get what I set in the camera,
say, Cloudy -3.

3. Also, many people seem to use Cloudy -n and few seem to use
Flash. Why is Cloudy better than Flash (for flash pictures).

Thanks,

--
-Ken
http://pbase.com/kennethevans

Click to expand...

Kenneth Evans said:

I am confused about the following two white balance issues:

1. By all acounts, including the D100 manual (p. 53), I get the
impression that there is a 1-1 correspondence between the names
used for WB (e.g. Cloudy -3, Flash +2, etc.) and the temperature
(e.g. 6600K, 5000K, respectively).

However, in Capture I get a distinct difference between, say,
Cloudy 6600K and Flash 6600K. That is, if I make a copy of the
image and set the original and the copy to these numbers, the
pictures look quite different. The histograms are different, too.
This indicates there is more to WB than temperature. And sort of
leaves you hanging in regard to choosing a value to use.

2. Suppose I take a picture at, say Cloudy -3. Does what I see in
Capture with either WB Off (Red X) or at Recorded Value (these
appear to be the same) correspond to no WB or to Cloudy -3.

If the latter, when I then set the WB to Cloudy 6600, to what does
this correspond.

If not, what do I do in Capture to get what I set in the camera,
say, Cloudy -3.

3. Also, many people seem to use Cloudy -n and few seem to use
Flash. Why is Cloudy better than Flash (for flash pictures).

Thanks,

--
-Ken
http://pbase.com/kennethevans

Click to expand...

w4npx said:

Bob

Kenneth Evans said:

I am confused about the following two white balance issues:

1. By all acounts, including the D100 manual (p. 53), I get the
impression that there is a 1-1 correspondence between the names
used for WB (e.g. Cloudy -3, Flash +2, etc.) and the temperature
(e.g. 6600K, 5000K, respectively).

However, in Capture I get a distinct difference between, say,
Cloudy 6600K and Flash 6600K. That is, if I make a copy of the
image and set the original and the copy to these numbers, the
pictures look quite different. The histograms are different, too.
This indicates there is more to WB than temperature. And sort of
leaves you hanging in regard to choosing a value to use.

2. Suppose I take a picture at, say Cloudy -3. Does what I see in
Capture with either WB Off (Red X) or at Recorded Value (these
appear to be the same) correspond to no WB or to Cloudy -3.

If the latter, when I then set the WB to Cloudy 6600, to what does
this correspond.

If not, what do I do in Capture to get what I set in the camera,
say, Cloudy -3.

3. Also, many people seem to use Cloudy -n and few seem to use
Flash. Why is Cloudy better than Flash (for flash pictures).

Thanks,

--
-Ken
http://pbase.com/kennethevans

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

w4npx said:

You might want to check out pages 52-53 of your D100 users manual
for Kelvin correlation numbers as they relate to Nikons definition
of Fluorescent, Direct Sunlight, Flash, Cloudy etc. It also
explains how each difference (+1,2,+3 etc) relate each to a
difference of mired value of 10 and how to calculate mired value.

Click to expand...

Kenneth Evans said:

w4npx said:

You might want to check out pages 52-53 of your D100 users manual
for Kelvin correlation numbers as they relate to Nikons definition
of Fluorescent, Direct Sunlight, Flash, Cloudy etc. It also
explains how each difference (+1,2,+3 etc) relate each to a
difference of mired value of 10 and how to calculate mired value.

Click to expand...

I said that (except for the mired, which is not important to this
question, only to appreciate how they chose the values for the
adjustments). It says what deg K corresponds to the numbers. It
doesn't say how to go backwards and get the settings from the deg
K, as you have to do in Capture. Moreover, it indicates there is a
1-1 correspondence between their names and deg K. Whereas in
Capture deg K with different names are clearly not the same. That
is, given a deg K, you can't determine the setting.

It also doesn't answer the question of what you have to do in
Capture to match the setting in the camera. Picking the same name
and choosing the deg K from the table may or may not be the correct
thing to do.

The bottom line is that I would like to understand what they have
done. It is apparently more than replacing deg K with a name. You
really need to understand this to pick a setting intelligently.

--
-Ken
http://pbase.com/kennethevans

Click to expand...

Paul of Kirkland said:

You're absolutely right, Ken. Reading the book just doesn't do it.
The best solution would have been for Nikon to implement the
settings directly in degrees K (as has been said before). Olympus
did it. Canon did it. Come on Nikon!

Click to expand...

Kenneth Evans said:

Paul of Kirkland said:

You're absolutely right, Ken. Reading the book just doesn't do it.
The best solution would have been for Nikon to implement the
settings directly in degrees K (as has been said before). Olympus
did it. Canon did it. Come on Nikon!

Click to expand...

I agree, but for now I'm stuck with what we have. I still would
like to know how people handle this.

--
-Ken
http://pbase.com/kennethevans

Click to expand...

Paul of Kirkland said:

Kenneth Evans said:

Paul of Kirkland said:

You're absolutely right, Ken. Reading the book just doesn't do it.
The best solution would have been for Nikon to implement the
settings directly in degrees K (as has been said before). Olympus
did it. Canon did it. Come on Nikon!

Click to expand...

I agree, but for now I'm stuck with what we have. I still would
like to know how people handle this.

--
-Ken
http://pbase.com/kennethevans

Click to expand...

OK, so the number applied by the camera and the same number in
Capture don't result in the same color balance in the picture.
Maybe one way to characterize it would be to take some pictures and
play with the settings in Capture to find values that result in no
significant change to the histogram. The result would be a table
of values corresponding to the icons used by the camera (plus and
minus 3) The table could be compared with the one in the D100
manual. I'm betting they wouldn't match. Ostensibly, it would
take a lot of work but in practice it would only be a matter of
working with the daylight and flourescent settings, since those are
the only ones Capture will allow to be tuned (a total of 21 values).

What bothers me is that, if you take a picture in 'daylight', then
add 200K in Capture (for a total of 5400K), and then click 'Flash'
(also 5400K) - the picture color changes radically.

Paul

Click to expand...

Paul of Kirkland said:

Ostensibly, it would take a lot of work

Click to expand...

Member said:

What bothers me is that, if you take a picture in 'daylight', then
add 200K in Capture (for a total of 5400K), and then click 'Flash'
(also 5400K) - the picture color changes radically.

Click to expand...