White Balance Procedure

[Ron Little]

OK this may seem like a stupid question. When you are shooting video on a 7D what is your procedure for white balancing ?

[Gianni Paolella]

It's not a stupid, is great question due that I think the WB is a big problem.
Normally I put in front of the lens a white paper or gray 18% paper, I take a picture and inside the Wb menu I choose the manual one, choosing the picture I take as referment.
After that I shoot video.

[Ron Little]

Thanks for that. I wanted to make sure I was doing it right.

I miss just pointing the cam at white card and pushing the button.

[Norman Pogson]

I miss the Nikon white balance procedure, it's a lot quicker.

[Chris Hurd]

Thread title changed from "stupid question" to "white balance procedure."

Please keep two thing in mind when posting at DV Info Net:

1. There are no stupid questions here. The only stupid question is the one that isn't asked.

2. Avoid ambiguous thread titles. They're counter-productive to other folks searching for the same info.

Thanks in advance,

[Ron Little]

Thanks Chris I feel smarter already.

[Greg Fiske]

I'll use the presets on the camera. If I have a lot of time, I'll use something like an expodisc to calibrate. The hard part is that when you are indoors, once adjusting for white balance, the image will look cool. I'll tend to adjust the color to amber by two points. If you get way off with your white balance, in my experience, I've never been satisfied with the correction in post, so its important that you get it right. I'll also eyeball it with the chart below (you could add it to your cf card as a cheat sheet to look up on with gigs).
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_jKmZuAR3Ft.../colortemp.jpg

[Richard Gooderick]

I did some shooting in a (primarily) photographic studio which had a colour temperature meter thrown in as part of the package.

I had problems setting up the lighting in the studio (I was using a light table with three light sources).

The problem was identified when I measured the colour temperature of each light and found that one was substantially different. I had been told that they were matched.

This seems the easiest way. Point the meter at the subject and then dial the temperature into the camera.

I haven't used one before or since. So there may be drawbacks that I am unaware of. Apart from the cost.

[Rob Lyons]

I always use colour temperature to set white balance. I use either 3200k or 5600k as a general starting point depending on the light source and tweak from there.

[Luke Gates]

Originally Posted by Ron Little

Thanks for that. I wanted to make sure I was doing it right.

I miss just pointing the cam at white card and pushing the button.

550d/T2i plus magic lantern equals this :-)

[Craig Terott]

I always just "get it close" then tweak in post.

I used to use cards, then I would STILL end up tweaking in post.

[Norman Pogson]

A lot of travel photographers would set their cameras on cloudy +1 as their default setting, it gives a warm look.

[Daniel Karr]

I used to just dial in the WB using the Kelvin scale on the 7D. But recently I've been using the method of taking a picture of a white card and using the custom WB setting. I think the results are much more accurate. The custom WB setting will correct for green/magenta, while the Kelvin setting will not.

[Evan Donn]

I find using custom improves the accuracy of skin tones (which is usually what I care most about) and I generally use a kodak gray card to set it - I've done some tests and it's definitely more accurate. Compare the RGB histogram on an accurate white or grey surface with a single light source - custom will give you a matched histogram across all three channels, presets and temp settings won't. In a mixed lighting situation I would expect an expodisc would be the most accurate since you could more easily restrict your correction to your key light.