pcn> *ist D, tungsten WB setting, ISO 800, f1.4 @ 1/45th: pcn> http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=3145171&size=lg
Oh I know, Paul, it almost looks like I am clashing into your opinions ;-) Perhaps I wrote it confusingly. I was hinting at that the WB feature of digital is not miraculous, like still many people think. It just boosts the _digital_ gain of the B or R channels (AFAIK only D2X does the boost of gain still before AD conversion, which might be beneficial). Add to it that tungsten light (normal household bulbs of 2700K, not your 200W floodlights <g>) are defficient in blue (just look at their spectra), and I see that the blue pixels are quite underexposed. Especially at higher ISOs where we are boosting the gain even more just for the speed. The result? All these blotches of blue channel noise all over the shadows and maybe even skintones. Yes I am talking about iso 800-1600. The outcome? Simply that complete white balancing under defficient light source has its drawbacks. But it was the same with C41 negatives. You could tell the lab to balance it if it was shot under tungsten, but still, because of defficient blue part of spectra, the blue sensitive layer would get underexposed. And we would get more grain and sometimes strange colours as the lab tweaked it. When I shoot under such lighting, either with film or digital, I usually just let it be golden yellow, adjusting the WB only very slightly. Whew, all this words to just tell that there is no free lunch! Now what ;-) Frantisek
