Preferred way to set white balance?

Jane B.

I purchased a used D60 a while back but am just now getting a chance to use it more. There is a 12th Night Celebration in the Fellowship Hall at my church tomorrow night where I will be dealing with fluorescent lighting. I am not sure which way of dealing with white balance (auto, fluorescent, or custom) is most likely to turn out the best with this model camera. If I go with custom white balance would you set using a white object (sheet of paper?), a Pringles lid, or I am trying to remember if the cup from the icing with some cinnamon rolls was also at one time suggested for this or just as a diffuser for flash.

If I go to shoot RAW rather than JPEG the only conversation software I have is what came with the camera. I would love to try RSE but my computer is running WIN 98SE and doesn’t really have the resources to upgrade to XP.

Any guidance will be appreciated.
Jane

Andy

shooting with flash, or available light?

Jane B.

Andy wrote:

shooting with flash, or available light?

Available light. Things could be happening anywhere in the room and I could easily get out of range of built in flash (which I haven't used by the way). The only external flash I have that is more powerful is a 420EZ from film days that I can't take advantage of the features of with the D60. As a side note, why did Canon have to do that to us? I spent more on it to get the features it includes with the idea of using it indeffinately.

Thanks for the quick reply, Andy.
Jane

PS Please also see my thread about modified "kit lens" as the most economical way to get to an around 17-18mm wide lens.

Andy

As hard as it will be, I would shoot in RAW. You get to set the wb each pic, and you don't get "stuck" with your one decision. Otherwise, follow the cameras instructions, and set a manual white balance before the shoot, that will get you the best results.

cmason

I am sure that there is a scientific way to figure this out...but why not just put it on Auto, then shoot RAW? Regardless of conversion program you use, this gives you the freedom to set the best whitebalance for each shot, correcting a significant problem. I mean, if the WB is wrong, the photo will look so "off" that you surely won't notice the minute differences in RAW conversion programs (I can't see them myself anyway).

The trouble with choosing one WB or going custom is that if your situation changes ( a room with incadecent lights, others with lots or few flourescents lights), your WB will change. You could always shoot a card in each location, setting custom WB at each location, but that would be cumbersome in your situation.

Jane B.

I am leaning toward doing a custom WB for tonight. The whole event is in one room with fluorescent lighting as the main source (3 isolated incandescent fixtures - 2 of which may or may not be on).

I am currently doing some more checking of the RAW Image Converter program that is on the EOS Digital Solution Disk that came with the camera (remember this is the old D60). I have only used it once and as I remember I was wishing for more WB control with it.
Jane

cmason

Jane B. wrote:

I am currently doing some more checking of the RAW Image Converter program that is on the EOS Digital Solution Disk that came with the camera (remember this is the old D60). I have only used it once and as I remember I was wishing for more WB control with it.
Jane

Check here , where you can download the updates to Canon's Digital Photo Pro. I have been happy with it for basic RAW fixes and conversions to JPEG.

Jane B.

cmason wrote:

Check here , where you can download the updates to Canon's Digital Photo Pro. I have been happy with it for basic RAW fixes and conversions to JPEG.

Went there and it is not clear if it would run under Windows 98SE. What information is there really leaves me doubting that it does. Does anyone know for sure?
Jane

ExposeTheMoment

Jane

For future go and buy this http://www.whibal.com/products/whibal/index.html

But the easy thing to do is ALWAYS shoot raw. Then no matter what setting you shoot in can always be corrected.

Let me ad, I do use this product while shooting raw. this gives me a while balance when processing the images using c1

mrcoons

Last fall I was in a series of low light shooting situations and used a custom wb which worked failrly well. But I was still not satisfied with the results. Since then I have started shooting RAW with a WhiBal card as was previously mentioned. It's a lot easier that way, even just using the free "RawShooter Essential" (have upgraded to the Premium version now).

So if the Canon software will work on Win98 (RawShooter Essentials will not, it requires WinXP) then that's the way I'd go.

Jane B.

Example of what I got
Never did find out if the DPP upgrade would work with Win98se.

So, used custom WB balance setting it off of a sheet of Georgia-Pacific Multi-Purpose paper which is labled as 90 brightness. Most lights were fluorescent with one incandescent fixture by the elevator (which is overexposed and doesn't show up) and two incandescent fixtures behind the arch (one at either side pointed at back wall)

This is a general overview of the room taken from the stairs at one end of the room.

Jane B.

2nd Example of what I got
Introducing video which hasn't started yet.

Buster

ExpoDisk
Jane,

RAW is the way to go for ultimate control...But, have you considered using an Expodisk?

Andy,

Do you have any comments about the Expodisk?

Jane B.

3rd (and last) example of what I got
Symbolic foot washing was set up behind blackboard seen in other shots behind the TV.

I am still uncertain about posting shots from church events as I am not sure how the people in them feel about having their photos on the internet. So, have not gotten Smugmug account not knowing just how much I would use it. At this point I would rather the fee for that account go towards a wider lens.

By the way, these shots were taken with the first version of the 28-70 3.5-4.5 Canon lens (NOT the MKII) that I purchased on April 29, 1988. Of course, at that time it was for a film camera — the EOS 620.

ExposeTheMoment

Buster wrote:

Jane,

RAW is the way to go for ultimate control...But, have you considered using an Expodisk?

Andy,

Do you have any comments about the Expodisk?

You dont want a Expodisk to time consuming to use. Check out the WhiBal.com product Its a lot easer to work with.

Matthew Saville

Being a Xanga follower of the inventor Gary Fong, I have heard of a program called "Bullzeye" that is basically color correction software for JPG images. Apparently it's really good; people switch from RAW back to JPG when they "discover" bullzeye. I'm already super happy with my RAW workflow on a fast computer and CS2, but for Win 98 and a "came-with-the-camera" RAW converter, If you are going to be running this setup for some time to come, I would definitely look into the wholly acceptable option of JPG shooting and custom setting the WB.


My preferred way to set white balance is indeed after-the-fact, on the computer. However, I need to say something regarding a few comments here, and the slight tendency to be of the mindset "oh just let everything slide and then 'fix' it later on the computer!"

"Fixing" is not what you are doing! This word is loathed by digital purists, and conversely the digital nay-sayers will accuse "fixing" of being "doctoring". Both are wrong and blind. RAW is what we should have been shooting all along! JPG is equivalent to scanning a print and throwing away the negative. RAW is this digital negative.

Digital is not about "fixing" or "doctoring" your images, it's not about being "lazy" and "neglecting" camera settings. Those camera settings weren't there in the first place! So when you shoot RAW, just consider it to be capturing a digital negative, when you edit your RAW's on the computer don't feel guilty of "doctoring" your photos, you're simply processing the negative in a new way that doesn't require insane amounts of money be spent on film and paper etc. etc.

-Matt-

PS- The photos turned out great! I'm glad things went well, and I hope you can continue to get good results the way you are going... Take care!