White Balance/Exposure Help

[arihn]

Hello. I am wondering if anyone know the secret to getting this clean, cool color on their images. My images are always off-balance. I love how this photographer has clean, bright, cool images with a smidge of warmth on their faces. What am I doing wrong? I am frustrated trying to get this type of image. Here are the photos that are NOT mine.

[Polar01]

Well arihn welcome to CIC, it would be helpful if you could go back into settings and add your name which is a little more friendlier than arihn and also where you are in the world, this helps if you want to get something we can tell you where to get it.
As to the secret to get images that you liked, well you are not going to be happy with me, it is learning and practice with a lot of heavy practice. Most of the posters here can and do post similar images, it is not that hard for some of us, but it takes times to learn how to achieve your vision, there is no secret sauce. How she does take knowledge of the post processing programs that one uses and how to use the camera to get that vision, it is not just a matter of pointing the camera and pushing the shutter.
As to what you are doing wrong, well we need to see an image that you took and then processed to have any idea of your skill levels. Also what would help is how long you have been shooting, camera (make and model) and program that you use to process your images.
Please read up on how to post images so we can see, what your images look like so we could make possible suggestions.

Cheers: Allan

[Manfred M]

Hi Arihn; welcome to CiC.

You really give us very little to go on, other than a website with fairly standard looking images.

As Allan has alluded to, pictures like the ones you have linked to are fairly easy for an experienced photographer; it's all about the light and knowing how to take the shot, and then once that has been done, how to fine tune the image in post-processing.

You are going to have to post some samples of your own work for the members to look at and comment on. It's nice to know where you want to go with your photography, but it is more important for us to establish what your starting point is.

Have a look at this link that gives instructions on how to post images and then post some of the images that you are not happy with here.

HELP THREAD: How can I post images here?

[AB26]

arihn,
The technique used by Poly Mendes is not quite my style but is very popular for shooting portraits.
Spot meter and use exposure compensation to brighten the face of your subject.
Learn the technique of shooting to the right.

[DanK]

Arith,

Welcome to CiC. I agree, you don't really give us much to go on. However, I will hazard a guess about what you mean by "cool images." It looks to me as though the photographer deliberately set the white balance very cool for the effect that he or she wanted. Look at the husband's face, and notice the bluish tint in the snow, for example, in the fourth and fifth shots. As a test, take the fourth shot, and use an eyedropper on the snow in the bottom left to reset white balance. That dramatically warms up the image. If this is what you want, you could start by making your white balance cooler than neutral.

[Manfred M]

Andre - I can't agree with either of your statements. If you import the shots and look at the histograms, they show a nice end to end distribution from the deepest blacks to the brightest whites.

A few more clues; the studio is located in the Northern part of the USA. The shots are taken on an overcast day in the winter; so not only is there a lack of shadows, the scene is quite snowy, so the lightness is emphasized. A lot of people in Minnesota are Caucasian with very light skin, given many of them have ancestors that immigrated from Germany and Scandinavia. Us light skinned Caucasians tend to look very pale in the winter given that we spend a lot of time indoors.

This is especially true of children; their skin is often so pale it borders on the translucent. Pictures of both of my daughters at the age of these girls would have looked quite similar.

arihn,
The technique used by Poly Mendes is not quite my style but is very popular for shooting portraits.
Spot meter and use exposure compensation to brighten the face of your subject.

No need to do that; exposure appears to be bang on. Lightening the faces would also lighten everything else in the shot too, and that does not appear to be the case here. While there is snow in the scene there isn't enough to significantly impact the exposure, but as a general rule, snow scenes tend to come out looking too dark, as the camera's light meter tends to darken the shot as it tries to bias to a neutral gray (i.e. it would tend to underexpose the shot).

If I were concerned about the lighting, I might be tempted to use an incident light meter to double check my camera readings. This is something that works quite well in portraiture. However, commercial photographers working in this part of the USA likely have that part down pat.

Learn the technique of shooting to the right.

No - ETTR (Exposure-To-The-Right) has nothing to do with this look. It is a technique that generally cannot be applied to a snowy scene. It requires room on the right hand side of the histogram and snow, being "snow white" means these shades are already in the shot, leaving no place to expose to the right without blowing out the whites.

[rpcrowe]

First off, in order to get the fullest versatility in your images, I seriously recommend that you shoot in RAW and the use an editing program of some type after you have opened the RAW images.

Trying to do any creative work with letting the camera do all your processing is not really possible.

I am not particularly keen regarding the skin tones in the images by Polly Mendes. They seem "washed out" to me but, I realize that there is a niche of photography that enjoys this type of image...

While you can certainly achieve results like this with Photoshop or Photoshop Elements, IMO using one of the Photoshop or Elements Plug-Ins such as NIK Software or OneOne Perfect Photo suite is a very easy to achieve creative images.

[William W]

.. . . My images are always off-balance. I love how this photographer has clean, bright, cool images with a smidge of warmth on their faces. What am I doing wrong? I am frustrated trying to get this type of image. . . .

Post a couple of sample images with the EXIF attached; and other shooting details such as location, time of day and lighting used as doing so will make it a lot easier to address your questions.

WW

[ajohnw]

I'm not keen on the skin tones in the images either. The only ones that show a touch of warmth to me is of the lady - make up.

Some look a touch soft - probably processing at the size they are shown.

it looks to me that the one factor all of the shots have in common is sensible choice of black and white points and the tonality between them - that is often achieved with an adjustment called curves or another less flexible one called levels. There is some black clipping in places but not to an unacceptable level. White is clipped too in places, usually a bad idea but ok with these as he people are as intended. Rather than being literally clipped it's more of a drop in detail level.

There are 3 controls which can alter "warmth", saturation, chomaticity and to some extent plain old brighntess / contrast adjustments but really the above adjustments need to be correct before applying them especially if as these are fairly natural shots are needed.

There are several tutorials of the CinC home page on post processing. Jpg's can also be processed but there is generally more scope for adjustments when working from raw. I would say probably not on these providing the exposure was correct.

One other thing I would add is that if the faces in the shots look warm to you I suspect your monitor needs adjusting or there is something wrong with mine - which there isn't.

Most people on here would not produce shots like these - they look too real and they wouldn't be happy with some of the skin tones.

John
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[arihn]

Hello, everyone. My name is Ashley I am attaching some of my images.

[arihn]

Maybe that didn't work.

[arihn]

I shoot RAW with a Canon 6D (gasp!) not like the 5D markiii she shoots with. I do editing in both Lightroom 5 and Photoshop CS5. Even her sunny photos have a smidge of "coolness". Yes, I live in chilly Minnesota, USA. -Ashley

[arihn]

Ashley here...again. Here is a link to my SmugMug outside gallery. I feel like they are yellow, brown, lackluster.

[chauncey]

See post 12...Flash and/or Studio Lighting

[Stagecoach]

The password does not seem to work Ashley?

Edit : it did when I typed it in

It would be far better to post a couple of specific images here where you include all shooting data, and can refer to concerns regarding those images. Posting information is within the FAQ section.

Grahame

[DanK]

I shoot RAW with a Canon 6D (gasp!) not like the 5D markiii she shoots with. I do editing in both Lightroom 5 and Photoshop CS5. Even her sunny photos have a smidge of "coolness". Yes, I live in chilly Minnesota, USA. -Ashley

Your camera has nothing to do with this. I really mean nada. There are reasons to prefer a 5D3 to a 6D--I own a 5D3--but image quality is not one of them. The 6D is a superb camera, and it will produce images every bit as good as a 5D3--in fact, better in some circumstances.

I agree with others that we could offer more help if you singled out a few images and said specifically what you want to change, but based on what little you have said, I still think that most of what you are talking about is the unnaturally blue white balance in the images you like. I took a screen shot of the large image on your wedding page, since you have downloads turned off, and made a simple change. I hope you don't mind my posting this example, but I will delete it if you do. All I did is import the screen shot into Lightroom and move the white balance slider left to -24. That gets me this, which is in the ballpark of the examples you posted in your first post:



I prefer your original. The people in your original look alive, healthy, and natural. The people in the edited version don't. But if this is what you like, try just pulling your white balance to the left and see how close that gets you to what you want.

[Manfred M]

Hi Ashley - I've looked at both sites; yours on SmugMug and the one you posted earlier today.

I have the same problem as the other posters; there is such a large quantity of material; I'm really not sure about which images that you are referring to. My earlier comments were purely based on the images on the home page of the Poly Mendes site.

Again, the cool, bright images on the home page appear to be a product of the lighting that the images were taken under. Overcast, winter day (with the snow acting as a giant white reflector) = diffuse lighting with little or no shadow detail on the faces. The only real colour seems to be from the makeup the woman is wearing.

Other images in the portfolio seem to be much warmer with shadow details quite evident in the shots. Some, with the "raccoon eyes" are actually not well executed.

You are going to have to give us some specifics to work with here. Specific images of hers that you are trying to emulate and specific images of yours where you are not succeeding in the look you are after.

Based on what I know from a number of wedding photographers I know; you can virtually guarantee that her technique is likely done in-camera as there seems to be little or no post-processing that is evident in the shots

[William W]

It would greatly assist if you chose a couple of your images and specifically described what it is that you want to achieve with them.

HOWEVER - having looked at 6 pages of your work and Mendez's three wedding galleries, there appears one (perhaps two) repetitive element(s) which is (are) consistently different in the two sets of images:

Mendez, when shooting into the light does, not blow the background highlights on exposure - and you do (or you bleed them out in Post Production).

It is difficult to tell frOm Mendez's small gallery pics but, extrapolating from those images with harder shadows I expect some of her back-lit images employed Flash Fill and yet I cannot see any evidence in you images of the same.

I am not clear at all about what you want to achieve - you do need to post or link to a couple of your images with EXIF details and etc as previously requested and also a commentary of how you want the image changed.

BUT, having stated that, I suspect that you will not get to your goal if, when shooting into the light, you are employing a shooting technique which simply seeks to overexpose (blow-out) the background.

WW

[mrinmoyvk]

Hello. I am wondering if anyone know the secret to getting this clean, cool color on their images. My images are always off-balance. I love how this photographer has clean, bright, cool images with a smidge of warmth on their faces. What am I doing wrong? I am frustrated trying to get this type of image. Here are the photos that are NOT mine.
http://blog.polymendesphotography.co...-photographer/

Sorry but did you like the images posted on the website you mentioned? Obviously it is your personal inclination towards the WB in image. For me those are too whitish and I like a bit warmth in portrait shots unless I am trying something different.
Technique which I use is spot metering with single focus point on face (most of the times on eyes). Unless the background becomes extremely bright or extremely dark, I stick to this method.

[AB26]

As I said, not my style but some people do like it.

In this shot I used flash and bumped the ISO. In Post I added a white vignette.

Look how washed out the skin tone is in the face of my grandchild. There is no detail and no texture at all.
This was an impulsive, happy snap taken and no setup was done. (Crappy BG. I can remove the tile grout in the BG if I wish but since it is a crappy shot I won't bother.)



Doing the same thing outside, on a bright day, especially when you got snow around, makes it easier when you understand how to drag the shutter while using flash. You also need to understand how to use manual WB. (BTW this was shot in JPeg.)

The EXIF of the above shot is in place so you can see how I have set up my camera.