Color rendition with Pentax DSLR

[ernest_b]

<p>Hello everybody,<br>

I use my Pentax K100D for 5 years now, and I've always found the colors a bit strange sometimes, above all in indoor situations. Here is an example : (removed by moderator)

The brown/khaki/yellow/skin colors are bizarre, even after correcting the White Balance and selecting a grey point as reference for White Balance, etc.<br>

I very often come to this conclusion : my K100d produces strange colors in indoor situations, like indoor neon artificial lighting.<br>

Do you feel the same ?<br>

If someone can see this .PEF file and give me his conclusions, thanks in advance !</p>

[michael_elenko]

<p>Nope, this shot looks exceedingly typical and normal color-wise. I assume it was taken under fluorescent lighting, and even an auto fix tweaks it fine. Is your monitor calibrated with a hardware device?<br>

RAW-file colors are very malleable. What software are you using to process and evaluate?</p>

<p>ME</p>

[ernest_b]

<p>Thanks Michael for your answer. I really find these colors (before & after whitebalance correction) flat and weird (above all the brown / khaki / greenyellow tones).<br>

(I work with LIghtroom, and I know how to do the white balance, with a grey neutral zone, and yes my monitor is calibrated).<br>

------------<br>

Maybe here is a better example : (removed by moderator) The photo is underexposed, but I can recover this with Exposition (without generating any disturbing noise).]</p>

<p>Still done indoor with "hall" lighting (neon I imagine).<br />Even after whitebalance correction, the skin color in not very beautiful, the colors are always weird. If you achieve to do something good, could you show me the result ?<br>

I'm sure this picture could have been punchy, vibrant, "pop", "happy", but it's not. I don't understand why.<br>

Thanks!</p>

[michael_elenko]

<p>Color balance is linked in part to proper exposure, and as you said this shot is underexposed. It looks like that darned white cat threw off your meter, but cats do that :) Simply correcting the exposure in Lightroom helped a lot. Plus that old sensor never performed well above ISO 400 for me.</p>

<p>In this photo another challenge is that her skin has noticeable changes in tone. But really, why don't you use a strobe? Indoor office lighting mostly is terrible.</p>

<p><img src="http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-G3r377G/0/L/i-G3r377G-L.jpg" alt="" /><br>

ME</p>

[jeremy_corbin]

<p>I agree with ME. The tones in the first photo were simply an indication of the awful light temperature from the florescent lighting. Good for keeping lighting costs down, bad for everything else. At even 1/20th at ISO 400 you'll note that it wasn't very bright either. The human eye thinks that there's plenty of light... The camera disagrees and struggles to get enough light to come in for a proper exposure.</p>

<p>I also agree that using a flash definitely aids with these types of photos. Although I *hate* on-camera flash I'll note that there is a time and a place for it, particular the 2nd photo you posted. I might suggested that you back the flash compensation to -1 or even -2 and leave the ISO at 400 or even 800 to minimize the "flashy" look while bringing in ambient light. I don't know how the K100 deals with ISO 800, but the older *istDS does fairly well when there is enough light. Only experimenting by shooting your cats at home could really tell you what works for you. You may decide that my suggesting doesn't work for you, and that's totally fine.</p>

<p>Most people may set their WB for each given situation, but I generally find myself leaving my WB at Flash and just adjusting it in post. It makes it easier to capture "the moment" instead of "This subject looks interesting, hold on let me change my WB real quick" and before you know it the moment is gone. I also find myself shooting more with flash than without, hence the suggestion.</p>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<p>Those shots corrected quite well in Adobe Camera Raw. I used Adobe Standard Beta2 camera profile and clicked around with the WB eyedropper tool on what would be neutral objects (like the cat/center wall or metal pipe below the hat).</p>

<p>Wish my images fixed up that fast with my K100D. I shoot in some weird mixed lighting situations where I have to use HSL panel on individual colors to get it to look right.</p>

[ernest_b]

<p>Hi! Thanks a lot everybody for your answers. This is very helpful!<br>

Unfortunately, these people didn't allow me to post these photos on internet, that's why I have put the files on a temporary hosting place, in order that I can delete them later. Could you remove the files from this topic ?<br>

(Once again, thanks a lot, but it's just because these people didn't allow me.)</p>

 

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<p>Sorry for posting the screen shots of the corrections. Ask the moderator to delete what I posted if that's what you're referring to as "the files" wanting to be removed from this topic.</p>

[jeremy_corbin]

<p>Ernest, I'm fairly certain you do not have much to worry about as far as posting these photos here. You're not posting them here for profit, you're not judging the subjects (demeaning them in any way), and you took the photos in public. I do understand where you're coming from but even street photography by it's nature throws permissions to the wind based on points I just outlined. You also, more than likely, have photos taken of you daily as you go about your life since the governments of larger countries often have video cameras at every street corner. The others here might disagree with me, but this *is* the grey area after all. :-)</p>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<blockquote>

<p>If you achieve to do something good, could you show me the result ?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I missed your previous post before uploading the screenshots, so now I really don't know what you meant by not wanting the results posted here.</p>

<p>Other than that you could from now on set the Pentax's WB incamera preset to "W" fluorescent which gives similar results shown above instead of incamera's Auto WB's warmer rendition. That way if you don't happen to have a neutral reference to click on in post, you'll be quite a bit closer to what's shown above.</p>

[peter_russell4]

<p>I used a K100D for years. The indoor white balance was pretty poor . I did however find that using evaluative white balance off a white surface was good. The best solution I found though was to do the evaluative reading directly aimed at the light bulb. Results then usually very good.</p>

<p>Pete</p>

[jaophotography]

<p>I kind of got here late, but I've attached a comparison of why the color is off with the K100d. The color with the k100d I find to be more accurate than the later cameras. The yellow turning greenish problems can be seen in No. 11, 12, & 16 in the image attached. The circles are the K100d, and the squares is the ideal camera.<br>

One major thing I noticed was I couldn't shoot vibrant fall colors with my Pentax cameras. I borrowed my friends D40x and the yellows started looking very good. A side note; I shoot entirely in DNG Raw for editing in photoshop. It is possible to manipulate the colors to resemble the correct shade, but it's difficult.<br>

I don't know why the Pentax cameras have a shift towards green with the yellow hues, but it does, and they havn't gotten any better.<br>

For a suggestion to fix the problem. I parked my k100d's white balance on daylight and sometimes on manually set white balance. Then later I adjusted the hue towards the magenta side about +15, which usually fixed the problems in outdoor lighting. Exposing bright also helps, but don't clip the highlights.<br>

Hope that helps.<br>

-Jon</p>

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