CTO gel turns everything to green tint, what am I doing wrong?

2manydjs · Feb 25, 2017

Hello,

I have just received a set of gels (Selens) and wanted to take a family photo in Tungsten light, to which I wanted to add light by using my speedlight with an OTC gel to keep the colours in sync. However, the picture turned green!

Just now I did a test and I have posted some pictures below from this test to show what happens. What am I doing wrong that the colours are completely unexpected?

I used the full CTO gel from Selens, which is specified to bring the light to 3200K. My speed light is a YN 560 IV and the camera is an Olympus EM5 II.

As reference: subject with tungsten ambient light only, WB set to tungsten. Seems rather natural to me given the low tungsten light. (AWB did give an overly warm colour)

Same subject lit with speedlight, no gel. The WB setting was set to flash light (5500K). Colour as expected..

Same subject lit with speed light, full CTO gel. The WB setting was set to Tungsten (3000K). My expectation was the warmth of the picture somewhere between the two above, instead it has turned green. (I understand that the ambient Tungsten light is blown away)

The tungsten setting of my camera is 3000K according to the manual, instead of the 3200K gel. I feel however that this is marginal difference compared to the crazy green cast/tint.

hotdog321 · Feb 25, 2017

That's a head-scratcher. A CTO gel on a strobe and the camera set to tungsten and shooting under tungsten ambient light gives me very clean results.

These exposures are way off, but no way you should be getting that horrible green tint. Just to verify--the CTO is rather orange color. I assume your flash gel is orange. I'd also double check the camera settings. These are OOC jpegs on the Houston Public Media set after a show:

--
photojournalist
http://craighartley.zenfolio.com/

Nixon Glenn · Feb 25, 2017

Can you post the picture of your cto gel on top of white paper? (use flash and WB to flash)

PenPix · Feb 25, 2017

I just did the same test on my Fuji X-E1 and it turned out perfectly fine.

Is there a possibility you applied a shift or correction to the white balance that you forgot to remove?

fotowbert · Feb 25, 2017

PenPix said:
I just did the same test on my Fuji X-E1 and it turned out perfectly fine.

Is there a possibility you applied a shift or correction to the white balance that you forgot to remove?

That could explain why the 1st image, tungsten light & tungsten WB, also has IMO a greenish-yellow tint. To my eyes it does not show the chairs/wall as being close to neutral white which I assume is the actual color as shown in the 2nd image using flash & flash WB.

John

Brian Alpert · Feb 25, 2017

Quick question: what white balance did you set on your camera? I have a feeling you were using auto white balance, which would average out the colors. When using a CTO (orange) filter, the white balance should be set to incandescent.

If you were shooting raw, you could easily fix this by changing the white balance to incandescent.

Hope this is helpful.

2manydjs · Feb 26, 2017

I have reset all my WB settings and also tried a few settings I had never changed before. All leads to the same results... I did manage to lower the green tint manually by adjusting my WB tungsten setting with Green -5.

Below a flash lit photo of the CTO gel, and some photos of my camera settings.

What should I try next to solve this?

CTO gel on white paper

Reset all settings

WB settings before and after the reset shows the same.

[ATTACH alt="Turned off "keep warm color" and "Flash + WB" "]1567588[/ATTACH]
Turned off "keep warm color" and "Flash + WB"

Tried all three settings.

2manydjs · Feb 26, 2017

Tonight I will bring in a different camera and see what happens.

j_photo · Feb 26, 2017

2manydjs said:
Below a flash lit photo of the CTO gel, and some photos of my camera settings.

What should I try next to solve this?

CTO gel on white paper

A CTO gel is orange, not yellow.

hotdog321 · Feb 26, 2017

j_photo said:
2manydjs said:

Below a flash lit photo of the CTO gel, and some photos of my camera settings.

What should I try next to solve this?

CTO gel on white paper

Click to expand...

A CTO gel is orange, not yellow.

+1. This is NOT a CTO gel. CTO is orange.

--
photojournalist

Photos by Craig Hartley

Welcome! I am an editorial photographer based in Houston, Texas. I've put together some of my cool, fast-loading pages for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!. Welcome! Craig Hartley is an editorial photographer based in Houston, Texas. I've put together some of my cool, fast-loading picture pages for...

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Ellis Vener · Feb 26, 2017

hotdog321 said:
j_photo said:

2manydjs said:

Below a flash lit photo of the CTO gel, and some photos of my camera settings.

What should I try next to solve this?

CTO gel on white paper

Click to expand...

A CTO gel is orange, not yellow.

Click to expand...

+1. This is NOT a CTO gel. CTO is orange.

--
photojournalist
http://craighartley.zenfolio.com/

CTO as in Color Temperature Orange

--
Ellis Vener

http://www.ellisvener.com

Free your eyes and the rest will follow. (With apologies to George Clinton.)

Sailor Blue · Feb 26, 2017

Check the color of this gel.

B&H - Rosco E-Colour #204 Full CT Orange (21x24" Sheet)

In photography colored filters block light light of opposite colors. In the color wheel below see how orange (or amber) is opposite blue. Orange is also further from green than yellow. If your filter is yellow then it will block less green light than an orange filter, which might explain the green cast to your images.

The reason for using a filter that blocks blue, and to some extent green, is that the spectra of daylight or from a xenon flash is much richer in blue and green light than light from an incandescent bulb. You can see this by comparing the daylight and incandescent spectra below.

--
Living and loving it in Pattaya, Thailand. Canon 7D - See the gear list for the rest.

2manydjs · Feb 26, 2017

Thanks, I did understand that CTO is to change to Orange.

In the tungsten lighting the gel always seemed like a yellow orange to me, and most articles described it as yellow/orange so I assumed it was correct. However, I admit on the flashed photo it indeed shows very yellow.

The gels are ordered in the original packaging from full to to 1/4 CTO and all give me the green tint. I will check tonight in the packaging and see if the subset of colors are all mixed up.

EDIT

I should probably bring them to work so I can look at them in daylight...

Nixon Glenn · Feb 27, 2017

My suspicion was right. You took the wrong gel

The full CTO and half CTO looks like this

2manydjs said:
I have reset all my WB settings and also tried a few settings I had never changed before. All leads to the same results... I did manage to lower the green tint manually by adjusting my WB tungsten setting with Green -5.

Below a flash lit photo of the CTO gel, and some photos of my camera settings.

What should I try next to solve this?

CTO gel on white paper

Reset all settings

WB settings before and after the reset shows the same.

[ATTACH alt="Turned off "keep warm color" and "Flash + WB""]1567588[/ATTACH]
Turned off "keep warm color" and "Flash + WB"

Tried all three settings.

2manydjs · Feb 27, 2017

I tried to find the CTO gel, but seems none of the gels I tried gave the expected result. I guess the set did not include the correct gels.

thanks all for your replies!

Fog City · Feb 27, 2017

It is something that's useful in a gel filter set, filter names printed right on each filter. It's especially useful on location in weird lighting, if you don't have white light.

Nikon does it with their SJ1 pack, so does Rogue. Clip from Rogue's site for example: "Rogue Gels are individually labeled with the LEE Filter name of each gel and the gel’s measured f/stop loss value. For ease of use, correction filters are also labeled with the Kelvin color temperature correction." I've been very pleased with the Rogue set.

2manydjs said:
I tried to find the CTO gel, but seems none of the gels I tried gave the expected result. I guess the set did not include the correct gels.

thanks all for your replies!

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CTO gel turns everything to green tint, what am I doing wrong?

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