Using Gels with flash vs. Software hue/tints
ok, im never out of stupid questions so here is another...
im looking into getting some Gels for my flash... but i was thinking maybe i could get the same results using Lightroom.... is this possible? or is there just no way in beating the results of using gels and flash correctly?
is this crazy talk? please help my ignorance in the matter...
im looking into getting some Gels for my flash... but i was thinking maybe i could get the same results using Lightroom.... is this possible? or is there just no way in beating the results of using gels and flash correctly?
is this crazy talk? please help my ignorance in the matter...
Aaron Nelson
0
Comments
If you just want to change the color balance of your entire image, then yes, it's very quick to just adjust the WB in camera raw or lightroom. The real purpose of gels is when you want to change the color in just one area of your image. For instance, you can put a gel on a background light so that you have a blue, red, green, yellow, etc. background behind your subject. You can use a CTO gel to give your subjects a warm, pleasing skin tone while leaving the background natural, or if there is a sky in the background you can use Tungsten WB on your camera to make it go deep blue while the main light on your subject looks neutral or slightly warmed.
All of this would be much more complicated and time-consuming to do in post processing because you'd have to use layer masks to separate the image into different sections that you could then adjust independently. Much quicker and easier to just stick a gel on your flash.
The other reason you'd want to use gels is to match your flash to the ambient light, whether fluorescent or tungsten. This ensures that the flash lit area of your shot and the ambient area have the same color and that you don't get weird color shifts in different parts of your image. If you don't use gels in these scenarios, you either have to accept the color shifts or try to fix them in PS which would probably be extremely difficult.
http://blog.timkphotography.com
Gels allow you to bring different light sources spectra closer together... Human eye+mind combo is capable of making real-time dynamic asjustments, which today's cameras are utterly incapable of...
Unlike ND/split ND and like CP, this effect can NOT be achieved in s/w without painful masking work...
As mentioned above - gels are used for color balancing with ambient light or for alteration of color for creative control. Pretty straight forward with gels, but very hard to do in Photoshop without endless selections and masks.
Get the gels. You will be much happier for them. MPEX.com sell's them pretty cheap
Honlphoto.com sells'em too
Lot's cheaper than a new lens
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
http://www.lumiquest.com/products/fxtra.htm
will hold Roscoe or Lee sample gels.