Setting White Balance Getting Accurate Color - Cheaply & Correctly

[redwatch]

I have not been a photog for very long, but I have been extremely lucky to have some great friends, both here and in my life, that have taught me a lot of great little "Tips & Tricks" to getting great shots. I am, by no means, an expert and I still have A LOT to learn, but I thought this little guide would be of benefit to all you lovers of photography - especially when shooting shots of your new timepieces!

For this tutorial I have used my Nikon D90, but for the sake of this lesson, please note - the camera is totally irrelevant! Of course, if you have a camera that shoots RAW, it's best to keep the pictures in RAW format, but JPG will work in this as well. As I mentioned, the camera is really not important in this situation.

I will demonstrate what I do each step of the way in both the setup & staging, taking the picture & processing the picture after the fact. I will be using Apple's Aperture 3 for this demonstration, so for you PC users out there, you will need to source an equivalent program - I am pretty sure Adobe Lightroom will do the exact same thing, but I have never used it so I can't speak for it's abilities.

Before we begin the tutorial we need to have a basic understanding on color and how light can severely impact the accuracy of color when taking a picture. For this, we need to have an understanding of White Balance.

From Wikipedia:

In photography, color balance is the global adjustment of the intensities of the colors (typically red, green, and blue primary colors). An important goal of this adjustment is to render specific colors � particularly neutral colors � correctly; hence, the general method is sometimes called gray balance, neutral balance, or white balance. Color balance changes the overall mixture of colors in an image and is used for color correction; generalized versions of color balance are used to get colors other than neutrals to also appear correct or pleasing.

Image data acquired by electronic image sensors � must be transformed from the acquired values to new values that are appropriate for color reproduction or display. Several aspects of the acquisition and display process make such color correction essential � including the fact that the acquisition sensors do not match the sensors in the human eye, that the properties of the display medium must be accounted for, and that the ambient viewing conditions of the acquisition differ from the display viewing conditions.

In other words - the light you shoot with will have a great impact on the reproduction of the colors seen in the digital image.

How many times have you taken a shot using indoor light and it looks really yellow and completely off? That is the White Balance at play, and how inaccurately the camera's Automatic White Balance setting reads the available light.

There are many many different types of imaging software for sale and each of them does different things well. However, without having a base-line to go off of, you can never really accurately represent the color of an object in a picture. This is the primary discussion of this tutorial.

By using a neutral gray card or object, with software, you can easily adjust the color of your picture. For this tutorial, and my every day use, I use a WhiBal Certified Neutral Gray card from Raw Workflow. You can find information here about it.

This is what they look like:

By inserting this card into your first shot, you can use this as your neutral gray base-line to which you edit all of your photos that are shot in the same light. This is an extremely handy little card to have, and the one I use is the size of a credit card.

Now that we have a basic understanding of light and color and how to correct it, we can proceed with the tutorial.

Step 1 - Staging the Shoot

So we are going to take a picture of a watch. For this tutorial, I am going to use the following:

Photo Tent (Purchased on sale for $9.99 including the lights and background)

Super Cheap Tripod

Nikon D90 w/28-80mm AF Nikkor Lens (Purchased new for $99.00)

Here's a basic shot from my Blackberry showing the basic setup:

By placing the WhiBal card in the first shot, we get this:

After you have taken the WhiBal shot, set up your watch and take some pictures. I have the camera in Aperture Priority mode, at f/16, but everything else is set to Auto. White Balance, ISO, shutter speed & focus.

Once you have taken your shots, load your pictures into Aperture 3 (or any editing software) and go to the first shot. Here is my first shot, un-edited:

Ok, so it's not too bad looking to start with. Having the gray background in the light tent has helped the camera along with setting a decent white balance setting. However, lets look at another set-up. This is just my desk, and overhead CFL lamps.

Again, my shot of the WhiBal Card:

And a picture of a watch:

Pretty horrible looking, isn't it? Let's move on to the next step...

Step 2 - Editing your Pictures in Aperture 3

So we've taken some pictures, and loaded them into Aperture. Now we need to start editing them. I am not going to go into any other adjustments at this time. All I am looking for at the moment is accurate color representation. So, first we need to go to our WhiBal shot.

So we've got our picture loaded. On the left side, there are three tabs. Library - Metadata - Adjustments. Click on the Adjustments tab. Next, we want to set our neutral gray setting. To do this, we go to White Balance, and click on the eye-dropper:

You can see it is asking you to choose a neutral gray in the picture. Choose a gray spot on the WhiBal card.

Now we have adjusted the white balance of this shot to an accurate 18% gray and you will notice the color has changed:

Excellent. Now we need to save this as a preset so that we can apply the same white balance setting to the actual picture. To do this, we go up to Presets and Select "Save as preset"

Name the preset (in this case, I called it "WhiBal Light Tent"). Next, go to the picture that you wish to adjust. Go back to Presets, and you will now notice that there is a selection named "WhiBal Light Tent". Aperture 3 will give you a little thumbnail preview of what the change will look like before you click on it.

If you like what you see, click on it and you are done. You have now edited the White Balance of your picture to a neutral gray base-line.

Here is a before & after shot:

Now, remember those really bad shots with the CFL lights? Again, here is a before and after shot using the same technique:

I mentioned in the title that this is something you can do cheaply. Camera cost aside, you will need Aperture 3 (or other editing software) and a WhiBal card. Apple sells Aperture 3 for $199.00 but for you internet nerds out there, I know there are "free" copies floating around If you are able to find an Aperture 3 license, you can download the free 30 day demo from Apple and then just enter the serial number and you are good to go. So, basically the only cost you are looking at is the WhiBal card

I hope you find this tutorial interesting and beneficial!

[krpster]

Great tutorial Redwatch! Very nicely put together. Thanks for that. I really need to get one of those light tents...missed it last time they were on 1saleaday.

[ubiquitous]

Great tutorial! May have to find me a WhiBal card

[redwatch]

Thanks guys!

Great tutorial! May have to find me a WhiBal card

Ubi your shots are pretty amazing as they are. You shoot with natural light, don't you?

[Guest ThePhilosopher]

I think your afters are a touch too cool. Neutral gray on the gray card and middle gray on the white balance panel are probably not calibrated to the same luminosity levels. Wouldn't it be easier to set the custom white balance in the camera using the gray card - that's how I traditionally think of gray cards and their usage.

[redwatch]

Traditionally yes, it would be easier, but not every camera has that ability. I thought this was a nice and easy way for anyone to do it. It's not perfect by any means, but given the amount of time it takes to do, and how ridiculously crappy the ambient lighting is in my office, I just wanted to show that you can still take decent shots with any camera in any light. This tutorial was meant to show what can be accomplished with just the neutral gray card & aperture (or any other editing software).

[Guest ThePhilosopher]

I agree it's a quick and efficient fix that'll work a lot of the time.

[Eton]

Wow, this is fantastic RED! Thank you!!!

[redwatch]

Wow, this is fantastic RED! Thank you!!!

You're welcome - although from the shots I saw of your Tudor this morning, I'd say you don't need my help by any means

[Eton]

Thanks bro!

[wheaton26]

very informative post ... thanks for sharing! oh, and nice rolex!

[redwatch]

very informative post ... thanks for sharing! oh, and nice rolex!

Thanks! It is a very nice Rolex and I have you to thank for that!! It sure does photograph well!