Manually setting White Balance?

[tim_knight]

I want to go into our church tonight and take some pictures with all of the

Christmas lights on. I have a D50 with tripod. My problem is the yellow light I

get in the pictures taken in the church. I just did a test at home using a

white card vs auto and the pictures are identical. I have a gray piece of paper

and tried this and it was way off from auto. I went to a camera shop and looked

at what an 18% gray plate, looks like and my gray paper was lighter. Any

suggestions would be grateful. I have the 18-70 zoom and 50/1.8 lens and

depending on the shots will be using both.

[hbs]

Your safest bet would be to shoot RAW. That way you can do all the adjusting you want after the fact.

 

Good luck.

[tim_knight]

If I was shooting film what would I need to do? I am trying to understand what makes differences using the camera and learn from that like everyone who started out using film. I hope this helps. I am not anti photo programs but it doesn't seem the same vs getting it done right in the camera.

[anthony_bez]

Tim, Think of your RAW/NEF file as a negative. And photoshop as developing the image. Then It is a very similar process to film photography.

[wilsontsoi]

Best bet is to take WB reading at the church (get there a little early,) and not at home. If you'll just show up, most likely the christmas lights (white) will be similar to incandescent, so I'd set WB as such. Shooting RAW is a good insurance, but probably best to at least try to get WB right in the first place to avoid post processing.

 

Lastly, a few folks had reported good experience with Expodisk, a convenient WB setting tool that I recommend, if you work in artificial light, or studio often.

[tim_knight]

Wilson,

I checked out the Expodisc and it just went on my Xmas list. I am a hard person to buy for so I should stand a chance on getting one?? If not I will buy one myself. Thanks for the tip.

[Ed_Ingold]

Christmas lights are meant to be colored. If not colored, them warm toned. I would just set the camera at "tungsten" and take what I get. If you use a grey card to set the white balance, the lights will probably appear blue. It doesn't matter which lens you use. If you use film, you can't set the white balance ;-)

[raczoliver]

I think you are misunderstanding the use of grey cards. Medium grey cards are used to take reflected meter readings (and they are mostly useful for black and white photography). They should also work for setting white ballance, but for that it should not matter whether it is dark or light, as long as the colour is neutral.

[wilsontsoi]

BTW, if you use film, I'd spring for a tungsten balanced film.

[juan_parm_nides]

The easiest way to solve this issue is using the Nikon Capture NX. Select white point tool in a place where you previously know it is white. And that's all. Cheers.

[robert_martin5]

I find the WhiBal card works good for this type situration. Set your camera to a fixed white balance close to the light source and take one image with the WhiBal card in the scene - you use this to correct all other images taken in the same lighting condition. They have a plug-in that works with several editing programs and it allows you to correct JPG images with a few clicks of the mouse. It also works excellent with RAW images, which is the way I use it. I also have the Expodisc, but find this is easier is some situations. If you set a custom white balance using a white/grey reference it needs to be netural, which is not easy to find.

[edk1]

I use a WhiBal card to make a reference photo with the card in the scene to correct all future shots made in the same light and also as a target for a custom WB (I shoot D70 & RAW). Both approaches work well as long as the light is not mixed. In a mixed light situation, IMO, since there is no single light temp an approach such as ExpoDisk to average the various elements of the mixed lighting gives better results (actually in my case it's a white coffee filter - the poor man's expodisk).

 

Having said that, I recently came across a troubling discovery (at least shooting Nikon NEF files and using Nikon Capture NX). If I create and save a WB setting by shooting a reference image with the WhiBal card in the scene and the camera's WB=X (X is any setting that you care to use), loading and applying this saved WB for subsequent shots made in the same light works great - EXCEPT

If I shoot in the same light, but change the camera's WB setting from that which was used in the reference shot then the image that results from loading and applying the saved WB doesn't work. The image has severe color casts.

 

Apart from why would someone do what I did, this calls into question the gospel about "why shoot in RAW" - "To be able to undo and correct camera settings made during shooting". I built a nine image gallery with explanations that demonstrate this problem. Any ideas? You can view the gallery at http://www.pbase.com/ed_k/white_balance

 

In Tim's case (sorry that this is after the fact; new photo.net member) I'd grab a white coffee filter and cehck the D50's manual for how to create a custom WB. Works great on a D70.

 

Ed K.