Hi, i have the Ex1r and i need your help.
According your experience, what is better?
A white paper, or a grey card for White Balance??
I am doing 100% weddings and i am using tungsten lights.
Thanks

A white card is the best.

Porta Brace | White Balance Card | WBC | B&H Photo Video

These are great, if you buy a Portabrace bag they come with it.

You can also get a warm card selection from Vortex media, they are really good. They are both pure white and skin tone enhancing:
Vortex Media: VIDEO & PHOTO Tools and Training (http://www.vortexmedia.com/WC_VIDEO.html)

yeah, maybe someone can explain using a gray card as opposed to a white card. i've never understood that technique. it is called white balance for a reason after all, right?

Whether grey or white it does not matter as both have no colour. I often balance on the grey sky on an overcast day. So as long as the card is neutral you will get an accurate balance. If you use warm cards they have a slight blue tint to increase the red end and warm up the picture.

Whether grey or white it does not matter as both have no colour. I often balance on the grey sky on an overcast day. So as long as the card is neutral you will get an accurate balance. If you use warm cards they have a slight blue tint to increase the red end and warm up the picture.

in my experience, just this past weekend, there is a difference between white and gray cards. on on overcast day, i got 5600K on a gray card and 7100K on a white card. i used the 7100K WB

I had to shoot an interview today, and the whole office/workshop was lit by overhead flourescent lights. I have only tungsten lights, so 90% of the light on my interview subject was tungsten. When I white-balanced on my subject, the background was so blue it hurt, so I went to a preset, that gave me a much nicer background. Problem was, my subject was a slightly odd colour. I didn't know how to fix it... Was there a way? (I know that maybe I should get some flourescent lights in my kit). Would a grey card help?
thanks, Malcolm
P.S. I'm eager for answers, because I have to shoot at the same place tomorrow.

in my experience, just this past weekend, there is a difference between white and gray cards. on on overcast day, i got 5600K on a gray card and 7100K on a white card. i used the 7100K WB

Were they "official" white and gray cards? :-) Note that much of the "white" paper, cardstock, etc. we see and handle every day is "enhanced" with chemicals to make it look "more white", particularly recycled paper as people are demanding more "green" products.

If at all possible turn off the fluorescents, or at least block as much of them as possible then light with your lights.

If using tungsten lighting also try to block all daylight, it will be very blue.

Sometimes the best way to shoot an office is at night and then completely light it with your kit.

I have big pieces of black fabric and sound blankets I bring on location to block unwanted light.

I know this is a tough situation and you may not be able to control it as much as I suggest, but give it a shot. If you have a step ladder you can actually just pull some of the over head bulbs, or have a janitor do it. At least around the talent. Shoot tighter shots and pay close attention to the back ground.

I had to shoot an interview today, and the whole office/workshop was lit by overhead flourescent lights. I have only tungsten lights, so 90% of the light on my interview subject was tungsten. When I white-balanced on my subject, the background was so blue it hurt, so I went to a preset, that gave me a much nicer background. Problem was, my subject was a slightly odd colour. I didn't know how to fix it... Was there a way? (I know that maybe I should get some flourescent lights in my kit). Would a grey card help?
thanks, Malcolm
P.S. I'm eager for answers, because I have to shoot at the same place tomorrow.

If you can not control the office lighting, then you need to adjust the light you put on your subject to match the color temp of the office lighting.

This is done by using lights that are closest in color temp to your source and by the use of gels to change the color of your lights.

Offices are often around 4100k so you could gel a tungsten instrument with a 1/2 CTB (color temperature or "to" Blue) gel or a 5600k instrument 1/2 CTO (color Temperature "To" Orange) gel to get close to a match.


Grey cards are used more in the photo world. This seems like an odd crossover as the CMOS chips take over the video world.

I use the $5 Porta Brace white card you can buy at B&H. They work well and are cheap so you can by a few and keep thim in your cases.

I cut one up to a smaller size to fit in a shirt or jacket pocket.

I had to shoot an interview today, and the whole office/workshop was lit by overhead flourescent lights. I have only tungsten lights, so 90% of the light on my interview subject was tungsten. When I white-balanced on my subject, the background was so blue it hurt, so I went to a preset, that gave me a much nicer background. Problem was, my subject was a slightly odd colour. I didn't know how to fix it... Was there a way? (I know that maybe I should get some flourescent lights in my kit). Would a grey card help?
thanks, Malcolm
P.S. I'm eager for answers, because I have to shoot at the same place tomorrow.

You really need to be carrying some daylight gels in your lighting bag.

However Colorista is a great tool for digging yourself out of holes like this. You can colour correct just part of an image. In many large offices it is impossible to turn off the lights without turning off the entire floor, or block daylight. So I get myself as close as possible using gels on my lights and then colour correct the subject using the tools in Colorista.

Colorista is so cheap (200 dollars) there isn't an excuse not to have it. It really is a problem solver. The ability to colour correct just the portion of the image you need is just fantastic.

Yes I know Apple Color can do this, but it is an utterly painful package to use and Colorista is just far quicker as you can make your changes in the timeline in just a few seconds. Invaluable.

But for goodness sake, buy some gels!

thanks for the advice, everyone. I'll use gels today (because I have them) and look into Colorista. Very interesting. Malcolm

Ok,
but what are most of you, use?
White card or grey card?
I am asking because some times i have seen very cold pictures, but the WB was ok.
Maybe a warm card solve this problem.
Thanks

White or gray is fine as long as they truly reflect equal amounts of red, green and blue. If it looks white, it's probably white. However, gray can be tinted slightly, resulting in a misread by the camera's white balance function.

Whether the card is grey or white is immaterial, as long as it's neutral. I suspect that some "grey" cards may not actually be grey at all but have a coloured bias.

What is more important than the exact card is how the white balance is done - at simplest this can mean do you do it in shade or sunlight out of doors?

Mixed lighting is another problem, and lighting in offices has already been mentioned. My advice would be if possible to turn all fluorescents off, if that's not possible to try and balance your lighting to them for colour temperature, and if all else fails colour balance near your main subjects face and let the background go to whatever. It's the skin tones that are most important.

Fluorescents come in different types, and the most common seem to vary depending where in the world you are. In the UK, the norm seem to roughly correspond to tungsten, and normally tungsten lighting matches fairly well. In hotter countries it seems more usual to have fluorescents that roughly match daylight, and it's interesting that around where Tim works the norm seems to be halfway between the two!

You need to take a colour balance in the natural lighting, see what the camera says for colour temp, then gel your lights to roughly suit, then re-balance to your lighting as a general rule. Your lighting will look right, the background should be close enough.

White or gray is fine as long as they truly reflect equal amounts of red, green and blue. If it looks white, it's probably white. However, gray can be tinted slightly, resulting in a misread by the camera's white balance function.

Most grey cards are not certified to be spectrally-balanced, but they are useful for many exposure readings. Paper products usually yellow with a short exposure to bright sunlight or brown with dirt dust.

I bought two packs of Kodak Gray/White cards before I realized that I should just pay for something that lasts: WhiBal plastic card. I find that I only use the 8x11" card for white balance. Sometimes, I can convince my wife to carry the smaller one and include that in a picture.

Digital Photography - RawWorkflow.com - WhiBal Certified Gray Card for White Balance (http://www.rawworkflow.com/whibal/)

What is unbelievable about this site is the dizzying array of product combinations and price points. I wish the fellow would cut the price of his large card and offer the three sizes or a three card kit.

Hi, i have the Ex1r and i need your help.
According your experience, what is better?
A white paper, or a grey card for White Balance??


As others have already said, it shouldn't make much difference if both cards are fairly neutral. The use of gray cards has traditionally been used by still photographers to set exposure, and they really offer no advantage at all to white balancing. None.

The nice thing about owning a PDW-F800 is that it can tell me the exact color temperature when I white balance, instead of rounding off to the nearest 100K. So I just did some testing with five different white references. I tried to be very careful about using them in the exact same position with auto-iris turned on so the exposure would be correct. Here's what I got:

1) Brand new genuine Kodak gray card that has been stored in a light-proof envelope.
Color Temp: 2695K

2) The backside of the Kodak gray card that looks pure white.
Color Temp: 2723

3) A sheet of white Staples brand laser paper (98 bright / 28lb)
Color Temp: 2752

4) A white 5x8 unruled Staples brand index card
Color Temp: 2725

5) The white card from a set of Vortex Media's WarmCards.
Color Temp: 2683

As you can see, there is only a 69 degree range between the highest and lowest. I doubt that anyone can see that tiny little difference in the raw footage -- let alone in an edited piece. I can't hardly see it when I switch between A and B memories.

Notice that there is only a 12 degree difference between the fragile, uncoated Kodak gray card (considered to be the standard by which other references are judged) and the rugged, virtually indestructible white card that comes with a set of WarmCards. We spent a lot of time when WarmCards were being developed to come as close as possible to the neutral response of the Kodak card. +/- 20 degrees is farily common.

It's interesting that the backside (white) of the Kodak card is 28 degrees different than the front. But really, who cares? Small differences like these are practically impossible to see on-screen. The bottom line is that you can pretty much white balance off of whatever you want if you only want a plain vanilla white balance -- which with all the Sony cameras usually looks too cool.

Warning: shameless plug coming up . . .

For a better white balance (especially for interviews and head shots) try using WarmCards. WarmCards - White Balance Reference System (http://www.vortexmedia.com/WC1.html)

I use the Whibal for my photo work as I shoot raw and really like the workflow by taking a shot with the card in the scene and adjusting in post. Easy and spot on.

I even took the Whibal card to Sherwin Williams and had them scan it to make a color mix for the paint on my walls. It is a true neutral.

I tried this card with video and I have to say, the white cards gave a more true white balance.

So in my expereince, grey for photo, white for video.

I've seen many many posts on this forum about white balance and exactly what to use to balance with and they almost always seem exceedingly nit picky to me.

I am very careful and caring about the quality of my color and frankly I pick up the nearest white piece of paper that looks neutral or even a little cold if possible ( white paper with blue lines works well) and it always seems to work fine. But really napkins can do the job in a pinch also. Its mostly important to get in the ball park. Most techs I know use a chip chart but then they paint from there anyway.

Often balancing through 1/8 - 1/4 blue and 1/8 green gives a nice warm balance if you are under flourescents or worried about greenish cold balance.

The truth is that if I am in a controlled situation I always have a good monitor and I adjust color to that either in the pp menus or by cheating my color balance with gels. In an uncontrolled situation the light is usually mixed and the paper color is the least of your worries. Where you point the paper is more important and then understanding how the light on the paper compares to what your subject is.

That's my 2 cents.

but what are most of you, use?

I use a Vortex white card. I used to have a DSC white card, sadly lost it.

A long time ago I was in a training group for Z1s, where we ran a little test white balancing on a 'white' wall, a bit of white photocopier paper, and a DSC White Card.

The white card was definitively the best colour balance; flicking between it and the white paper, there were subtleties of tone in the shadow areas that were missing in the paper-balance.

It's even more valuable now, with the EX1 and its lack of '+' and '-' Colour Temperature shortcuts. NB: As the EX asks for the exposure of the white card to be dialled down to about 60%, I guess that makes a white card into a de facto grey card.

I shoot a lot in mixed tungsten/daylight/fluoro situations, and habitually 'wear' a set of Vortex cards; the white is used 95% of the time, but can cheat it with the warm and cool cards. I wish there were a gentler cool card though. Doug?

Here is a White/Grey collapsible card and has worked great for me.

Lastolite | EZYBalance Grey/White Card - 20" | LL LR2050

The camera focuses on it and white balances fast and accurate. In some situations it's easier to get WB off the grey.

Here is a White/Grey collapsible card and has worked great for me. The camera focuses on it and white balances fast and accurate. In some situations it's easier to get WB off the grey.

If it works for you, go for it. But as you can see from my earlier post last night, you might as well us a piece ordinary paper if you all you want is a normal white balance.
White or gray, it's all the same to the camera.

I shoot a lot in mixed tungsten/daylight/fluoro situations, and habitually 'wear' a set of Vortex cards; the white is used 95% of the time, but can cheat it with the warm and cool cards. I wish there were a gentler cool card though. Doug?

Matt, thanks for the suggestion. If there are enough requests for a gentler cool card, maybe it might happen someday.