Canon Tips: get consistent white balance within the same scene

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Taking pictures in mixed lighting can make it difficult to judge the correct white balance setting. Here we show you the effects produced by each white balance setting and how to make a custom setting based on a reading from a grey card to deliver perfect results.

Canon Tips: get consistent white balance within the same scene

Custom white balance

You may have noticed significant differences in colour rendition between successive shots of the same scene, taken only a few seconds apart under the same lighting conditions. How can I get more accurate and consistent results?

Small adjustments in composition and almost imperceptible differences in lighting can alter the white balance. This is the single biggest issue when trying to get accuracy and consistency in a series of shots.

For example, imagine you’re taking a series of shots at a wedding, and want to create prints that will sit next to each other across facing pages in an album.

Consistent white balance is a must to avoid colour variations between pictures. The same holds true for when you’re shooting a series of photos to stitch into a panorama.

To avoid the vagaries of auto white balance, one option is to switch to your camera’s preset white balance setting that most closely matches the prevailing conditions. For example, you could choose the daylight setting for sunny conditions, or Cloudy or Shade depending on the weather.

Shooting indoors is more of a problem. Regular tungsten lighting has a very warm colour temperature which falls outside of the range covered by the auto white balance setting.

The quick solution is to switch to the Tungsten white balance setting, or the Fluorescent setting if the room is lit by ‘white’ fluorescent bulbs.

Effects produced by each of your Canon white balance settings

Shade

Cloudy

Auto

Daylight

Flash

Fluorescent

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 6th, 2013 at 10:26 am and is filed under Canon D-SLR Skills, Photography Tutorials. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a comment. Pinging is currently not allowed.