Would appreciate some discussion on white-balancing equipment & techniques

[Ken MT]

I tried setting up a custom white balance using a Jessops White card, but find that the histogram was not at the right but instead at about 90-93. I was using the card in the sun although slightly cloudy. I repeated it using a translucent background on Elements, but still came up with similiar graph and numbers. What was I doing wrong or did I not understand.

[Colin Southern]

I tried setting up a custom white balance using a Jessops White card, but find that the histogram was not at the right but instead at about 90-93. I was using the card in the sun although slightly cloudy. I repeated it using a translucent background on Elements, but still came up with similiar graph and numbers. What was I doing wrong or did I not understand.

Hi Ken,

I must admit that you've got me confused - why are you worrying about histograms when setting a custom white balance?

[Clactonian]

I can understand the desire to get consistency over series of exposures if they are going to be displayed together, but for individual shots I'm not sure what all the fuss is about.
I usually adjust the WB for effect at the edit stage .... and don't we all see things differently anyway?

[shreds]

Whenever I do night photography (one of my faves) I find that the use of a white balance card (like the Whibal) essential as the eye cannot differentiate correctly and sometimes takes ages in PP without some reference point.

I use a credit card sized one most of the time as it is inconspicuous if placing it in the scene for the first shot (from the point of view of someone else moving it!) and doesn't get left at home or in the car, it can be in my pocket or gadget bag.

There are times when larger ones certainly have an advantage, but that is for more specialised shoots.

There are certainly cheaper ones out there on the internet although not all are necessarily correctly set so I suppose you takes your money and makes your choice. However the plastic one are better and longer lasting than card nowadays.

[The Blue Boy]

Hi Ken,

In tricky situations I often find using the Live View mode to make slight adjustments. I find it most useful under street lighting.

[rhadorn]

I remember having participated in prior discussions about WB on this forum because I was very anxious of having the colors right. I used my WhiBal card a lot a that time but was not always satisfied with the result. My type of photography is mostly landscape. Today, I rarely use the reference card. This does not mean that I am always satisfied with the colors I get, oh no, but rather that the reference card is often of little use.

As a matter of fact, the grey card works fine in settings where there is ONE light source, or a few light sources of the same type or one source overriding clearly any other. This is achievable in the studio but is much less frequent as soon as you shoot outside. In most situations, if you take a picture of the grey card from four directions, you will get four significantly distinct readings. The one you make in the same direction as you take the picture will be the more appropriate as a reference, but most likely objects in the scene will be diversely affected by the various sources and reflections around. The most evident example is sunlight with blue sky. And it is not so, that only shadows are affected by the blue sky: sunlit objects will be, too, so the color temperature will vary for various surfaces depending on their angle to the sun. In the shooting situations which draw me (half) mad, there was also a strong reflection from the bare soil, a light reddish ochre as you can find on Crete. There is no White balance system capable of integrating meaningfully such a variety of sources.

Dominating colours are also a problem. Take pictures shot in woods for example. There is no way to get a good reference. You are a little better of if you can put a grey card in a sun ray, if you like to take that light spot as a general reference. But taking a picture in a small clearing with bright stones on the ground reflecting the blue sky and sunlit trees a bit further can be quite challenging.

At the moment I am working mostly with 360 deg. pictures, which all present a variety of light conditions.

My present rule is to get the best differentiation of colors in the processed picture, while respecting to a certain degree the general mood of the scene. To me, the 'best differentiation of colors' is in a kind the best approximation of a white balanced picture, since the best differentiation is obtained through eliminating to some extent the dominant introduced by the light source. But the aim of the correction process is not to get the colors 'right' or a good copy of some reality, but to maximize color contrast. I will cool down a sunny picture enough to get rid of the yellowish tone it may show, warming up some shades which get too bluish in the process. Even with a profiled system, I usually need 2-3 prints to get the image "right". In the woods, the green mood can be overdone by the reflection of light on the green leaves around (the green leaves work as a light source), so I tend to correct this a bit.

I also started observing much more colors in nature, to discover that the further the sunlit coulds, the warmer they are and that grass reflecting sunlight may be bluish but seen from the other side with light flowing through it, it turns yellow green. Color is in a way something to 'shape' and 'model' as a sculptor would do with clay. With many attempts and a few successes.

Reto

[Ken MT]

I would have thought that a white balance would show up to the right on a histogram.

[Colin Southern]

I would have thought that a white balance would show up to the right on a histogram.

Hi Ken,

I think we're talking at cross-purposes here - a histogram is a graph of the distribution of captured tonal values, and thus can be used as a guide to exposure, but it has nothing to do with white balancing.

[Dave Humphries]

I would have thought that a white balance would show up to the right on a histogram.

IF
you have a scene that contains no strong colours but does contain a decent amount of white (that you haven't blown),
AND
you are viewing an overlaid RGB histogram
THEN
when when the WB is 'correct', the peaks will coincide
OR
when the WB is 'wrong', you will see the colour peaks separate

That said, this isn't a method I would use to even check an average photo's WB on, because it is too easy to get misled by real colours in the image.

So yes, while it is visible under some circumstances, I think it's the wrong tool for the job most of the time.
Plus it'll only make fairly gross errors visible, Mk.1 eye ball on a picture is going to be more sensitive, although not necessarily accurate at getting it right; as monitor profile and viewing conditions affect our perception.

[arith]

IF
you have a scene that contains no strong colours but does contain a decent amount of white (that you haven't blown),
AND
you are viewing an overlaid RGB histogram
THEN
when when the WB is 'correct', the peaks will coincide
OR
when the WB is 'wrong', you will see the colour peaks separate

That said, this isn't a method I would use to even check an average photo's WB on, because it is too easy to get misled by real colours in the image.

So yes, while it is visible under some circumstances, I think it's the wrong tool for the job most of the time.

That's great I lost my grey card once, it blew blew away into the marsh, so instead of using one I guessed it afterwards using an histogram and lining up the colours to the right.

However, this wasn't everything and casts had to be dealt with, so I bought another grey card, which is a whole lot easier.

But you do have to point it 30 degrees into the scene or put it into the scene and a change of direction means a new reading. So it is always approximate unless you are in a studio where even with flash it is useful: my flash is 5600K but a flash photo came out 6900K