Tuesday, October 04, 2005

Color balance



My neighbor's shamrocks are blooming again. I think most people set the white balance on their digital cameras to "Auto". This is convenient and it works fine some of the time... but using the white-balance presets will provide the photographer with another degree of creative control. The first photo (the bluer one) was shot on Daylight and the other one was shot on Shade. Which one is correct? It certainly was shot in the shade, and I think the Shade setting is actually closer to "true"... but I like the bluer one better. The one I like wins.

6 comments:

Kim said...

Oh, the bluer one wins for sure!

kenju said...

I like that one better too.

stacey abshire said...

Yeah those are fun to toy around with. I like to tweak them in iPhoto and Gimp after I take them.. usually boosting the temperature, and sometimes the saturation.

My camera has the flourescent, incadescent, daylight, cloudy settings... It's also got some fun settings for shooting at the beach and in the winter on sunny days.

Some other fun things are playing with the EV control..

chaipo said...

I totally agree that the blue one wins. As a new photographer, I've found being able to adjust your camera before the shot truly gives you a different effect than using manipulation tools afterward. at least in my opinion.

Great photos!

Raymond said...

the more reddish one (lower one) also has more brown in the leaves and stem, which makes the plant look less healthy than the deep green in the "bluer" one.

--Ray

Paul Watson said...

Good point, Rick. We shouldn't be lulled by the technical correctness of automatic features.

And gypsybobocowgirl has it exactly right; adjusting the white-balance in post-processing is a grand arguement for shooting RAW.