Perhaps someone here, well, I KNOW someone here, can help me with this.
How would you say is the best way to achieve correct white balance IN
CAMERA with a digital camera in mixed lighting situations?
I normally use my White Bal grey card, then use that as my correction
point in post processing, then set the other photos taken under the same
lighting to the resulting corrected white balance...
Here is what *I* am thinking would be the only totally assured way to get
completely correct WB under such conditions. Use a color meter... (NOT
cheap)..., then set the Kelvin temp in the camera to that reading. That
would have the ambient lighting correct. Then, the correct color
compensating gel filter would have to be placed over the flash to arrive
at a matching color temperature from the flash. This would have to be
tested by using the color meter to be sure the flash temp now matched the
ambient temp.
Does any of this make sense to anyone... am I on the right track at all?
Does anyone here use such a technique to get white balance CORRECT in
camera, especially under mixed lighting conditions?
To Steve and the group,
From what you wrote, you seem to have diagnosed the situation correctly. The
bottom line is that shooting under mixed lighting is always a compromise.
You seem to want the camera to perform a minor miracle of reconciling
fluorescent lighting to flash. Some parts of the photo will have to look
weird.
In the past I shot architectural interiors with a view camera. In a mixed
light situation, like an office, I would shoot multiple exposures: one
unfiltered for my strobes - fluorescent lights off, then another exposure on
the same sheet of film, filtered for the fluorescents. Yes, I used an
expensive Gossen Pro 3F which was a little better at guessing the color
filtration than I was. Now with my 1Ds, I shoot separate RAW exposures, then
combine them in Photoshop.
But if there are people in the photos, the multiple exposure solution is
gone. You have already mentioned some choices:
1) Shoot AWB, as you have been, and accept the occasional green
hair
2) Put a 30G over the flash and 30M on your lens and the
available fluorescent will look a lot better.
If you take the second route, make sure the combo delivers a decent white in
studio testing. (This may not work with some dedicated auto-flash units
unless all sensors are covered with the right filter.) And you must be aware
that this combo will act as a neutral density filter robbing you of some
light. As a bonus, the combo will give you nice pink windows or daylight
fill!
When the lighting is consistent, AWB or Custom WB does a good job. But when
the lighting is mixed and you cannot control it, then you have to accept the
"odd" color accents. No gimmick like an Expo Disc or color meter will fix
this problem.
Stan Patz NYC
www.PatzImaging.com
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