Flash makes photos over saturated?

Shima · May 31, 2005

So I just got this Canon Powershot Pro1 (as in today) and have been feverishly testing my abilities with it... one thing that is continually bugging me is that the flash is continually causing images to be oversaturated. I'm doing indoor shots today since it was too late and dark to test outside, so I'm stuck to household things... lots of red and orange saturation... ideas on how to fix this?

Thanks

DavidTO · May 31, 2005

Shima wrote:

So I just got this Canon Powershot Pro1 (as in today) and have been feverishly testing my abilities with it... one thing that is continually bugging me is that the flash is continually causing images to be oversaturated. I'm doing indoor shots today since it was too late and dark to test outside, so I'm stuck to household things... lots of red and orange saturation... ideas on how to fix this?

Thanks

Sounds like a color balance problem. Is the color balance set to auto? flash? Shoot in RAW, and see what you get there, maybe.

Shima · May 31, 2005

Set color effects to nuetral and it's looking much better now

Thanks.

Still gettings used to having a camera with so many manual settings, heh.

DavidTO wrote:

Sounds like a color balance problem. Is the color balance set to auto? flash? Shoot in RAW, and see what you get there, maybe.

erich6 · May 31, 2005

You may be standing too close to the subject you're taking a picture of. Try stepping back a little. I don't know about the Pro1 but if you're using manual controls you may also need to adjust flash exposure compensation.

Erich

Shay Stephens · May 31, 2005

The problem you are describing is one of color temperature. In mixed lighting situations (e.g incandescent and flash) you face the unhappy situation of the incandescent being an orange color or the flash being a blue color.

Color temperature refers to the color of a light source. The lower the "temperature" the warmer it is in appearance (red/orange). Conversely, the higher the temperature, the cooler it looks (blue).

A camera will try to white balance on one or the other (it can't do both) and usually it's the flash that gets the WB treatment, leaving anything lit by the incandescent lights a very warm (red/orange) color.

In the "biz" photographers take care of that problem by using lights of all the same type or color temperature. Failing that, they will place a colored filter on the lights to try and balance the color across all the different kinds of lights to get a more consistent color temperature in the shot.

Shima · May 31, 2005

A lot of the lights in this room do naturally give off this yellow/orangish hue, so that was what I was thinking was part of the problem... but it's just wierd since this flash is so powerful and yet I still get this super saturated look to it... your explanation makes quite a good amount of sense.

I got my worst problems out of items that were already red... I was able to fix most of it up on photoshop, just a bit fustrating.... should I save in RAW on some of these funky pictures and try to trouble shoot there? This is my first time having a camera with a RAW option, so I've yet to do that and delve into the program necessary to work with it.

The best pictures I was able to get indoors were when I propped the camera up (I have no tripod...yet...) and took pictures without the flash but with the white balance set to Tungsten.

Picture done like that:

Shay Stephens wrote:

The problem you are describing is one of color temperature. In mixed lighting situations (e.g incandescent and flash) you face the unhappy situation of the incandescent being an orange color or the flash being a blue color.

Color temperature refers to the color of a light source. The lower the "temperature" the warmer it is in appearance (red/orange). Conversely, the higher the temperature, the cooler it looks (blue).

A camera will try to white balance on one or the other (it can't do both) and usually it's the flash that gets the WB treatment, leaving anything lit by the incandescent lights a very warm (red/orange) color.

In the "biz" photographers take care of that problem by using lights of all the same type or color temperature. Failing that, they will place a colored filter on the lights to try and balance the color across all the different kinds of lights to get a more consistent color temperature in the shot.

Angelo · June 1, 2005

shima wrote:

Father of the Year award goes to my dad: He snuck the morning of May 30th, drove to NYC (we're an hour and a half away) made a trip to B&H and returned with a Canon Powershot Pro1 for an early birthday present for me

Can't let that slip by.... COOL Dad! Happy Birthday.

Flash makes photos over saturated?

Comments