5D vs 5D MkII auto white balance

[danzel_c]

<p>i bought a used 5d and i'm loving it but the auto white balance seems to always produce results heavy on the warm side. does the 5D MkII do that too? or it is better at nailing white balance when in the auto WB mode?</p>

[mike_hitchen]

<p>Can you post a couple of examples?</p>

<p>Does this mean you are shooting JPEG only? If you shoot RAW you can change the white balance to whatever you want at the touch of a button or two.</p>

[bueh]

<p>I have never been fully satisfied by Auto WB with any camera (except for flash/concert photography). Better use one of the presets -- Auto too easily fooled.</p>

<p>If your 5D is too warm turn down the saturation a bit -- this is what I do.</p>

[matt_needham]

<p>I have both, and haven't noticed a difference in the auto-wb. I do shoot raw, and adjust wb in the raw processor though. After getting the 5DII I did notice that the 5D LCD has a green-yellow cast.</p>

[jesse_barba]

<p>AWB never works all that well. Either use a custom white balance in camera (easy to do) or shoot RAW and fix it at the computer.</p>

[g dan mitchell]

<p>Auto WB is always a compromise and the results will not be consistent. Better to shoot RAW and adjust in post if possible.</p>

<p>Dan</p>

[PuppyDigs]

5D/5D2 AWB is very similar if not the same. Actually I often find it to be on the cool side but WB is highly subject to taste.

No biggie as I too adjust to taste prior to RAW conversion. For mixed lights I sometimes convert with different WB and

blend the various versions in PS layers (using a mask). Looks amazing natural when done that way.

[wclark5179]

<p>An idea to help....</p>

<p>Capture in RAW.</p>

<p>In RAW mode white balance can be accomplished during the process stage with your computer.</p>

<p>Happy Thanksgiving!</p>

[danzel_c]

<p>thanks for the replies. i do shoot raw all the time, so i agree it's easy to fix. just wondering if there was any improvement in this area of the 5D MkII camera, but guess not...thx!</p>

[dan_south]

<p>I like Auto White Balance on the 5D2. I agree with Puppy Face in that it seems to err on the cool side, but not by much. Usually a small adjustment in the RAW converter nails it.</p>

<p>Tip: Since I know that I can always apply the presets during post-processing (easy to do in batch in Lightroom), I like to leave the camera on the Auto WB setting for most of my shooting. I can choose Daylight or Cloudy or Incandescent later, but I can't have the camera guess again after the exposure has been made. I feel that I might as well let it take it's best shot (no pun intended) at a WB setting. I can either use that setting or select something entirely different when I see the image on my calibrated monitor.</p>

[model mayhem gallery]

<p>I shoot with a 5D Mark II, Canon 30D and old ELAN 7NE (film camera). I can't see a noticeable difference in white balance between either of them. However, for my digital camera's I always do a custom white balance whenever possible. I still believe it is so much easier to get it right in the camera rather than adjusting each of hundreds of pictures I may shoot in a day.</p>