Can't get natural looking outdoor shots

Every picture I take outside comes out too green

It's as if the camera is stuck in vivid mode when I take pictures where there's a lot of green grass, trees, plants etc.

I have tried to change the white balance manually so it's to the right of centre, with more yellow and red, but that makes no difference. Have tried all the different white balance modes and only 'cloudy' comes closest, though it's a bit too yellow. They always come out looking too green in any setting mode.

In all other settings the pictures are great - very natural colours. It's like whenever there's a lot of greenery in one shot the camera oversaturates the greens and turns all the different shades of green into one electric green.

Any ideas? What am I doing wrong?

Using a 50mm 1.8 by the way.

Here's an example. The greener one is the original, and the other one is retouched to make the colour accurate.

Try shooting RAW and see whether or not it's the camera's algorithm that is altering the color when it does the JPEG compression.

Are you shooting in Vivid, More Vivid, Neutral?

smiles,, I kinda like the more vivid green. but you can always use the RAW version, check you saturation setting too, you might have it a bit cranked, and also your dynamic range compensation, it might just be the software cranking away.

I actually like the way the D7000 is more vivid than my D300 or 700. The newer sensors seem to look more like the CCD sensors like the D80.

Well, without knowing what your lawn "really" looks like, i can not say how "green" your grass should be. However, i do prefer the top pic to the bottom. I would set your saturation level to standard, if it is not already. Also, set your WB to auto. This is more of a lighting issue i think - i have the same issue with my fifty. Could also be something to do with your monitor not representing properly the photo your camera took. Play around with your exposure value as well. Good luck with the fine tuning.

Stangman98 said:

Are you shooting in Vivid, More Vivid, Neutral?

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The images are like this in all settings. Vivid only makes them look radioactive, and neutral makes them less saturated. Saturation isn't the problem it's the colours/colour range looks wrong and flat, like the camera only picks up one shade of green.

Mojo-Fstop said:

Try shooting RAW and see whether or not it's the camera's algorithm that is altering the color when it does the JPEG compression.

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How do I check those algorithms? What am I looking for?

D5100Shooter said:

Well, without knowing what your lawn "really" looks like, i can not say how "green" your grass should be. However, i do prefer the top pic to the bottom. I would set your saturation level to standard, if it is not already. Also, set your WB to auto. This is more of a lighting issue i think - i have the same issue with my fifty. Could also be something to do with your monitor not representing properly the photo your camera took. Play around with your exposure value as well. Good luck with the fine tuning.

Click to expand...

The 2nd pic is what the grass really looks like - I retouched it on my PC. WB was set at auto, and I tried other WB settings all got the same problem.

Thanks for the replies everyone I'll keep trying out different settings. Camera is very new to me so have a lot to learn. Still, doesn't make sense to me that auto won't take accurate images of greenery. I did reset all the shooting settings in case I'd messed it up. Unfortunately that didn't change anything.

Tweaked the WB down one of two squares in the colour chart and turned ISO down which got me what I wanted. Crisis averted lol. A small change in ISO and WB can make a big difference.

"the grass is always greener. . . ". lol. sorry, had to troll that in.

colors will vary from lens to lens I think. you can fine tune a white balance after picking the templates (sunny, cloudy shade etc) adjusting the temperatures on the color matrix in camera . it's that or do it in pp as you've done. or try an expo disc. I've been reading about those lately wondering if they are accurate. kind of pricey at around $100 a pop.


I'm not afraid . . . YOU WILL BE. . . YOU WILL BE. . .

What I meant was to shoot the image in RAW format and not JPEG, bring that image over to your computer and let ACR or ViewNX do the conversion/compression and see if you get the same results as when the camera is doing the JPEG conversion/compression.

McNikon said:

Tweaked the WB down one of two squares in the colour chart and turned ISO down which got me what I wanted. Crisis averted lol. A small change in ISO and WB can make a big difference.

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Color temperature and balance corrections that you've made are working for that particular shooting situation. Color temperature change and color corrections are mostly always needed to balance the end results. If for example you are shooting a model under a tree, there will be a tendency towards the green. In the shade, depending on what objects are surrounding your subjects, effect might be different. It's kind of the normal workflow to do some kind of color corrections to photographs. In the film days, I remember having to carry multiple color correction filters, a color meter and even then, after color separation the printers always had to make adjustments.

The camera sensor has no way to know exactly what the shooting conditions and subjects are. I don't know how the camera evaluates this, but for me it seems to work all right as long as I'm not expecting a perfectly balance shot before the post processing.