Warm Cards - www.warmcards.com
 

Has anybody used this product:

http://www.warmcards.com/

It sounds like it does a great job of helping to set the white balance on your camera. From what the web site says, it "warms up" your video.

Love to hear some feedback on this product.

Hi Paul,

They do work, but you could also save your money and make your own.

Be careful about overdoing it, sometimes less is more.

Check out the following url:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=4840&highlight=warm+balance+values

- don

Don,

Thanks for the reference to the thread. I'll give it a go and see how it turns out trying to make them.

You don't need to make actual cards...
Just buy a white card, then buy some gels you like (like 1/4th or 1/2nd to warm it up), hold the filter in front of the lens, point the lens towards the whitecard, whitebalance. There you go!

I've been using these for a little over a month now and love the results - just as advertised. I almost always use the Warm 1 card but I haven't found a need for Warm 3 yet. I'm going to order the Warm 1/2 and Minus Green cards soon.

There isn't much to them and you could probably make your own, but they sell for a fairly low price.

G

Greg,

Thanks for the response. Several others have suggested making them. With a price tag of $60 bucks, I would prefer to do that. What are they made of?

Paul,
These are nothing more than sheets of colored paper that are laminated with non-glare plastic. I'm not exactly sure how they were printed but it almost looks like photo paper.

Are you familliar with Pantone colors? If so, I tried to match them as close as possible to my color wheel which is a few years old and could be off.

Here's the approximate Pantone colors in daylight:
Warm 1 = PMS 290 C
Warm 2 = PMS 2707 C
Warm 3 = PMS 283 C

Hope this helps!

G

<<<-- Originally posted by Greg Vaughn : Paul,
These are nothing more than sheets of colored paper that are laminated with non-glare plastic. I'm not exactly sure how they were printed but it almost looks like photo paper.

Are you familliar with Pantone colors? If so, I tried to match them as close as possible to my color wheel which is a few years old and could be off.

Here's the approximate Pantone colors in daylight:
Warm 1 = PMS 290 C
Warm 2 = PMS 2707 C
Warm 3 = PMS 283 C

Hope this helps!

G -->>>

Greg,

Thanks for the information. I am familiar with Pantone colors. Will give it a look tomorrow. It would be great to save the money and do it myself.

You should be able to do the same thing in post and not modify the original footage.

I bought the set, and the first time I used them, I was pleasantly surprised.

It's hard to describe how they work, but the shots shown on their website are an accurate depiction of how they can help.

I haven't used them enough to really make a worthy contribution to this thread, but so far, I'm impressed. Time will tell. So far, I have only used Warm 1.

They aren't too expensive, and the complete set comes with both large and small ones (which are tethered to a neck strap) and a carrying case.

If you are planning on making your own, I would recommend that you laminate them using a matte finish laminate. Reflections on the laminate will undoubtedly give you an unreliable result.

I printed my own warm "Card" on my home HP printer on BEST quality and it worked like a charm. Made the colors a little more vibrant, which if you you know me I'm all about vibrant colors. I can't see any draw back of doing this except when you'll be shooting outside maybe? I did test it against the 18% gray and didn't like that look at all. I'd just use white instead of gray. As for now, i'm sold on the blue!

Do Warm Cards degrade footage?
 

Does anyone know if using warming cards of any kind degrades the image quality? What I mean is, using a warm card will not introduce any kind of artifacts or somehow lower the resolution of the footage, right? Because, from what I understand, processing your footage in post can result in lower quality video for, say, transfering to film later on. Is this true?

Jamie asks if using will degrade the image. Not in the sense that you are referring to, Jamie, but there are other things that can happen. When you "cheat" a white balance, by using a warm card, or any similar technique, you are making a "global" change to the white balance. In other words, all colors in the picture will shift according to the cheat that is applied, so that if you are using blue to warm the skin tones, it will also shift other colors in the same direction. So, the blue suit the subject is wearing, will shift to brown, depending on the degree of the correction used. If you wait until post to apply color correction tools, you will be able to be more selective/subtle in your corrections.

In regards to making color corrections for a film transfer, this is best left to people who are skilled in this area. Color correction is a very deep subject, and best left to those who have studied it and are skilled in the application. At least this is what I am certain the majority of transfer houses will tell you. You should always begin a dialogue with a transfer house long before you shoot any footage, for projects that are intended for transfer to film.

Good call, Wayne. I was planning on talking to a couple of DV to Film transfer houses before shooting. My main reason for asking is because most of my project will be shot in a school where most of the lighting is fluorescent. I saw that WarmCards.com has a card that corrects for fluorescent lighting, so I thought I'd ask about image degradation.

If the warmcard is such a fantastic gadget, why is it that the pictures on the warmcard website showing the "difference", are exactly the same, so obiously not made with different white balances, but in Photoshop (i.e. Post)?????? Ha!