Am I blue?

JulieLawsonPhotography

lol, I got my blue seamless paper yesterday. I also got a UV filter for my 50mm, gray cards and a soft white/gold reflector. I used the gray card on all these, but I don't know if it helped or not. LOL

I'm also on a new laptop, so I'm not sure how these images look to you all. My studio lights have decided to be brighter than usual. :dunno I need a willing model to sit and let me experiment though. Although, the lighting setup hasn't really changed at all.
I'm looking at some of them.....eh.....the coloring in her face on some :dunno

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Scott_Quier

You have such a cute little girl there. She certainly loves to work/play in front of the camera and does a good job of it - better than some professionals I've seen.

As for the gray card - the evidence seems to suggest you are not quite sure how to use it as your WB is all over the place.

There are at least two "correct" ways to use the gray card to get the proper white balance:

1. Set a Custom WB in camera - looks more difficult than it really is. You should be able to do this in about 15 or 20 seconds once you have the steps figured out
   • Take a picture of your gray card under the lights to be used in the shoot - the gray card should fill, at least, the center portion of your frame.
   • Once you have that on your card go through the process of setting your camera's CWB (refer to your owner's manual for the step-by-step), indicating to the camera that the shot you just took should be the CWB reference.
   • Set you camera to use that CWB setting - again, refer to your camera owner's manual for the step-by-step
2. Shoot the gray card and set WB in post
   • Shoot the gray card, again under the lights to be used in the shoot
   • Continue shooting your model
   • In post, open Adobe Bridge (I'm going to assume you are using CS3 or better), select the gray card shot and load it into Adobe Camera RAW.
   • Select the WB tool
   • Click on the gray card
   • Click on the "Done" button - this should close ACR and return you to Bridge
   • Select all the shots taken under that light
   • Using the context menu (PC: Right-mouse-click), select "Previous Conversion" - it's a sub-option, look for it.
   • Repeat for each different lighting situation.

Performing one (or both) of the above will get you consistant and, assuming a good gray sample, "correct" WB in your shots. The rub is that not all gray cards are, in fact, gray. There may be a color bias. In which case, you adapt to get the photos to look the way you would like.

Also, one benefit of using a gray card is that, done right, it can also be used to verify your exposure. If you, indeed, have an 18% gray sample, you should see a spike in the middle of your histogram.

JulieLawsonPhotography

Scott_Quier wrote:

You have such a cute little girl there. She certainly loves to work/play in front of the camera and does a good job of it - better than some professionals I've seen.

As for the gray card - the evidence seems to suggest you are not quite sure how to use it as your WB is all over the place.

There are at least two "correct" ways to use the gray card to get the proper white balance:

1. Set a Custom WB in camera - looks more difficult than it really is. You should be able to do this in about 15 or 20 seconds once you have the steps figured out
   • Take a picture of your gray card under the lights to be used in the shoot - the gray card should fill, at least, the center portion of your frame.
   • Once you have that on your card go through the process of setting your camera's CWB (refer to your owner's manual for the step-by-step), indicating to the camera that the shot you just took should be the CWB reference.
   • Set you camera to use that CWB setting - again, refer to your camera owner's manual for the step-by-step
2. Shoot the gray card and set WB in post
   • Shoot the gray card, again under the lights to be used in the shoot
   • Continue shooting your model
   • In post, open Adobe Bridge (I'm going to assume you are using CS3 or better), select the gray card shot and load it into Adobe Camera RAW.
   • Select the WB tool
   • Click on the gray card
   • Click on the "Done" button - this should close ACR and return you to Bridge
   • Select all the shots taken under that light
   • Using the context menu (PC: Right-mouse-click), select "Previous Conversion" - it's a sub-option, look for it.
   • Repeat for each different lighting situation.

Performing one (or both) of the above will get you consistant and, assuming a good gray sample, "correct" WB in your shots. The rub is that not all gray cards are, in fact, gray. There may be a color bias. In which case, you adapt to get the photos to look the way you would like.

Also, one benefit of using a gray card is that, done right, it can also be used to verify your exposure. If you, indeed, have an 18% gray sample, you should see a spike in the middle of your histogram.

Very helpful Scott. I will come back and do this step by step tonight. I shot the gray card and then just kept shooting as I thought that was all i needed to do. It is 18% gray card. I appreciate the feedback.

Trevlan

Julie, You should really prepare this beautiful young lady. She has very strong camera pressence, and could with no doubt in my mind, be a ver succesful child model.

Scott_Quier

Trevlan wrote:

Julie, You should really prepare this beautiful young lady. She has very strong camera pressence, and could with no doubt in my mind, be a ver succesful child model.

- I was thinking much the same thing - just didn't know the right words.