White Balance Can Change a Lot

I used to do 35mm slrs and develop my own pictures... that was over 35 years ago.

This is my first dslr and I have to say, wow. The flexibility you have in these things is amazing.

Just you show how white balance can impact your pictures, here are three with different settings. It's nothing new to you experts but I think this is way cool.





This

Amazing isn't it!!!

Pat in NH

Sensors are a lot like film...different cameras and lenses draw and paint different ways. Just like different films give different effects. One must learn the tools and what they do exactly.

it is interesting, I tended to leave it in auto,, but then I wonder if that makes sense. When you leave it in auto, the camera tries to mimic the way our human eye evens out white balance, when in reality, the temperature of light causes the images to vary quite a bit.

some advocate leaving it in sunlight mode most of the time, and let the sensor produce an image warmer or cooler than our eyes view.

can always adjust using the raw.. so lately, I have been experimenting more with WB. Happy snaps.

White Balance is the Kelvin factor which is important relative to your lighting. It is as important as aperture, shutter speed, and iso. The way you use your white balance imparts a whole lot to any given photograph. I use the flash setting on my dslr to impart the golden glow (which in camera speak really means that you are attempting to recreate the golden hour and the nice warm fuzzy brilliant light it gives) and flash is like 5K K and that is the setting I use most of the time too. Some times I'll set it at incandescent when I am indoors. A lot of my film stuff is around 3600K. Daylight film basically and it is tolerant of exposure. White balance is an easy way to gain control on how your snaps look.

It really is incredible just how much control you have. I tend to leave my WB in auto, but do use different ones often.

I was just amazed at the difference this setting made in these shots. It seems this is one of those settings that is really overlooked by dslr noobs.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised... I've been using point & shoots for too many years.

I have tended to always use Auto WB, and then see which looks better in post-processing... The number of times it has been a bright, clear day but stood in the shade of a forest yet generally the sunny setting looks better than the shade setting!

So far, I have left the WB on the camera set on Auto... I havre found (for me) more important to work on exposure, focus and composition. White balance can be easily manipulated in LR4.

That works for me so far.... Inetresting topic.

Pat in NH

I like the correct wb but prefer the incorrect one as it has more impact

Wait until you start shooting in RAW instead of jpeg and realize you can change white balance after you take the shot.

Cool picts unky. So the WB was post-processed to produce the two?

Gwlaw- I've got a long way to go before I start to do the post process stuff, but from the picts I've seen, it can really have an impact.

Hi alltimeqb the white balance was changed in RAW - It's a simple one click process to check each wb setting to see what the effect.

I've only been shooting RAW for a few months after deliberating for ages as to whether I should but won't go back now. I would suggest you try a few shots and see what happens!

Will ViewNX2 allow me to post process pictures? I have Photoshop CS2 that I use for work and know it can to that stuff, but I've never used it that way before.

ViewNX will allow some post processing, just not as much as LR or Photoshop.. Give it a try and see if it does what you need.. I used it for a bit before I acquired Lightroom 4.

Pat in NH

I use ViewNX for one function only,,, offload the pictures off the camera,,

I prefer Adobe CS for initial Raw adjustements.