White balance question.

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Name
Paul
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Hi all.

Just been watching a dvd my friend lent me Bryan Petersons the perfect picture.

In it he says just put your WB on cloudy and leave it there all the time.

Did i miss something? Or does this work?

Thanks:)
 
Having not seen the DVD I don't know within what context he says this - if you're shooting raw then you could be shooting on tungsten setting all day and it won't matter if you PP your photos, as you can just tweak the WB back to daylight....

Through the winter I shoot on a much warmer WB just for the benefit of the LCD preview so everything's not too blue. but again, in raw that doesn't matter because I can change the WB to whatever I want :
 
Yeh most of the time it works, Mines set to shade permanently and it's rarely wrong. I've yet to be in daylight that was actually 5500K.
 
Hi all.

Just been watching a dvd my friend lent me Bryan Petersons the perfect picture.

In it he says just put your WB on cloudy and leave it there all the time.

Did i miss something? Or does this work?

Thanks:)

It's just one of many stupid things Bryan Peterson says in his inexplicably popular books :shrug:

What he actually means is, for the things he mostly shoots, he likes slightly warmer images. Which is fine, but not everybody does and it's a bit of a daft view to take in a book all about exposure for beginners.

You should see what he says about the histogram, surely one of the greatest aids to accurate exposure ever. That is simply dismissed, alongside WB, "as one of the most over-rated controls on a digital camera" and is never mentioned again :eek:
 
iirc ole uncle Ken says the same thing as well - I usually have mine set on cloudy/shade...
 
Yeh most of the time it works, Mines set to shade permanently and it's rarely wrong. I've yet to be in daylight that was actually 5500K.

Your doing well if you can get away with just one WB and that's shade

It's just one of many stupid things Bryan Peterson says in his inexplicably popular books :shrug:

What he actually means is, for the things he mostly shoots, he likes slightly warmer images. Which is fine, but not everybody does and it's a bit of a daft view to take in a book all about exposure for beginners.

Very well said.


DAYLIGHT

daylight.jpg


SHADE

shade.jpg


AUTO
auto.jpg
 
Can't say I agree with the advice. All that using your camera permanently on cloudy setting achieves is to give a slightly warmer look to your images which some people may prefer, but personally I'd rather use the correct wb setting for the prevailing light for a more natural look to the shots. You can achieve pretty much any effect you wish in post processing anyway.
 
I've just been out to test white balance settings.

From what i've tested, it appears as though the Auto white balance is usually fine for taking shots, so there's no issue leaving it on AWB.

If you are using he flash though , make sure you stick the WB on flash, but normally the camera recognises that aswell.

So AUTO is fine.
 
I've just been out to test white balance settings.

From what i've tested, it appears as though the Auto white balance is usually fine for taking shots, so there's no issue leaving it on AWB.

If you are using he flash though , make sure you stick the WB on flash, but normally the camera recognises that aswell.

So AUTO is fine.

Did you try it in artifical light, like tungsten room light and fluorescent? Or with bounce flash?

You could try that on AWB, and then with a custom white balance under the same conditions, and post the results.
 
Did you try it in artifical light, like tungsten room light and fluorescent? Or with bounce flash?

You could try that on AWB, and then with a custom white balance under the same conditions, and post the results.

Unfortunately my gear has it's limitations lol :) So can't test out the fluorescent or bounce flash ...

I did test out tungsten though, , 9 times out of 10 the AWB choose it anyway :)
 
JUst been farting around in lightroom and , to be perfectly honest - what i thought and what the camera thought was the right WB at the time - isn't necessarliy. Some images looked much better when i changed it.
 
Sorry not been back on this post to thank everyone for the replies.

So what i have started doing is i try to set up my own white balance when i have time for the shot, and use raw when i am shooting in a busy area say a fate or party.

Again Thanks.:)
 
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