Photo Tip Thursday

{Edited to include a teensy bit more Kelvin detail}

Okay, today I want to talk briefly about White Balance.  {The funny thing is, I had a whole long post typed up, and then it got WAY too wordy and confusing, and so not brief.  So here I am, REALLY trying to keep this short.}

Different lighting situations produce different temperatures and can result in color casts in your photos.  Have you ever noticed that if you take a picture inside, under artificial lighting, that your photo has an amber-ish quality to it?  A quick white balance adjustment, and these photos will improve tremendously.

I'm going to be honest. When I first started becoming passionate about photography, I didn't notice lighting and color all that much. I just didn't pay attention, I guess. Now, even when I don't have my camera in hand, I take notice of lighting and color casts.

 These days, digital cameras have many WB options to choose from:

Auto
Daylight
Shade
Cloudy
Tungsten
White Fluorescent
Flash
Custom
Kelvin

I'll admit.  Sometimes I'll just set it to Auto.  If the girls are doing something cute, and I'm in a hurry, it works in a pinch.  It tries.  But it's not the best.  You're letting your camera guess, and that doesn't always give you great results.

Recently I've started using Kelvin, and I love it.  I feel like I have a lot more control this way.  Although, if I'm in constantly changing light, I find it to be a little time consuming.  If you have this option, give it a try, and let me know what you think of it.  {A little more info on Kelvin:  in the Kelvin mode you actually set the temperature you'd like to use.  So, at first, it's really kind of trial and error.  I think, in the photo below, I had my Kelvin set to around 3800 to cool down some of the amber color casts created by the artificial lighting.  For some, though, the photo might be a little too cool.  I prefer my images a little on the cooler side.  Can you use Kelvin outside?  Great question, Sarah Kate!  Absolutely!  You would then adjust the temperature according to the lighting outside.  For example, if I was outside on a cloudy day, and wanting to use Kelvin, I would probably set it somewhere around 5700 or 5800.  Not sure, exactly, as I still use trial and error a great deal.  But, you see, you are warming up the temperature to account for the cool casts due to the clouds.  Make sense?}

In Custom Mode you use a grey card to set your own custom white balance.  For some reason, I have not had great results with it.  I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, but I obviously haven't mastered it.

Daylight, Shade, Cloudy.  These modes adjust the warmth according to the color casts you'll experience when you're outside in different lighting situations.  If it's overcast, for example, you can set the WB to Cloudy, and it will "warm up" your images a bit.

Tungsten & White Fluorescent.  You may try one of these when indoors and using artificial lighting.  I use the Tungsten one regularly, and it helps to reduce some of that amber color cast I tend to experience when shooting indoors.

So, there ya have it.  A little run-down on White Balance. And a few photos to help you see it a little better:





{Top left was taken in Auto, Top right was taken in Tungsten, and the bottom was taken in Kelvin}.
The differences are subtle, but I think you can see that the top two photos are warmer.  And for fun, I took the photo below in the Cloudy Mode.  Whew!  Look how orange that one is!  That's just bad.


Now, the challenge:  If you don't regularly adjust WB, try it!  Use Tungsten inside to see if it doesn't eliminate some of the amber.  Get out your grey card and set a Custom WB.  And if you do regularly adjust, try a new mode that you haven't yet used.  Then, come back here next week and we can link up a before and after.  Take a photo without doing a WB adjustment {if you don't normally}, and then one with an adjustment.  Or show me a photo taken using an adjustment you don't normally use.

Happy Snappin'!