# White balance?



## adamcoe (Dec 5, 2012)

This is maybe more of a shooting question than a Lightroom question, but does anyone use anything other than Auto White Balance in their shots...and if so, why? And/or do any of you find you mess with the white balance in Lightroom after the fact (for artistic purposes, rather than just fixing a WB problem)?

The reason I ask is I saw an ad for a WB lens cap...it's basically a cap with a little white ball in the middle of it, so you shoot a shot with the cap on to get your WB, then take it off and shoot as normal...is there any advantage to this vs. just using AWB on your camera?

Cheers


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## Replytoken (Dec 5, 2012)

It is almost essential when shooting jpeg files, as you cannot change the white balance of a jpeg without impacting other qualities of the image.  When shooting raw and processing in LR, the WB setting does not really matter as it can be adjusted for personal taste in post processing.

--Ken


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## erro (Dec 5, 2012)

I shoot RAW, but have my camera set for daylight WB. First of all it gets me consistent results (auto-WB can sometimes make the wrong guess). Second, it preserves more of the natural color of light (auto-WB can sometimes be a bit too clinical, or cold). Once inside LR, I often adjust the WB to whatever suits the image best. Since I shoot RAW, I don't have to fiddle with setting the WB at the time of shooting.


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## Tony Jay (Dec 5, 2012)

I never shoot using auto-WB.
There are a few reasons for this.
Although I personally always shoot RAW and so do not have the issues associated with shooting JPEG I want a shot-to-shot WB consistency.
Also I shoot a lot of multishot panoramas and so do not want to have the hassle of individually correcting WB in each shot while trying to match up the panorama.
I generally shoot with the WB set to the cloudy setting (this is a matter of personal taste and should not be construed as a recommendation) even if WB adjustments are required in postprocessing.

Tony Jay


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## adamcoe (Dec 6, 2012)

ahh, good call, i never thought about panorama thing. thanks for the advice everyone, i just joined this forum a week or so ago and i've already learned lots. as an aside, what program(s) do you recommend for assembling panoramas? back in the day I was using Canon's own Photostitch, but I believe it relies somewhat on data from the camera itself (this was back when I was using an S5, using the "panorama" mode, which seems to save some kind of info as to where to properly stitch things together for use with Photostitch, although I could be wrong about this.)


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## Jimmsp (Dec 7, 2012)

If you shoot raw, and for a panorama, you will still need to adjust each photo. It doesn't matter what your camera is set at; but you can adjust each frame the same way rather easily in LR via a sync. Personally, I set it to auto, and I set my raw processor to auto as a start. If you shoot over 90 deg in a sweep, the white balance generally changes some as you pan, esp due to shadows. I generally have more issues with exposure from shot to shot.
As for pano software, I use in order : MS ICE (free), PT Gui, and lastly PS Elements. Generally the 1st two will get most scenes the best.


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## Glenn NK (Dec 8, 2012)

adamcoe said:


> The reason I ask is I saw an ad for a WB lens cap...it's basically a cap with a little white ball in the middle of it, so you shoot a shot with the cap on to get your WB, then take it off and shoot as normal...is there any advantage to this vs. just using AWB on your camera?
> 
> Cheers



Ah yes, the lens cap WB tool.

They are so valuable that the store where I deal (Lens and Shutter on Broad Street in Victoria BC) was clearing them out at 1/2 price a couple weeks ago.   Imagine screwing a filter on and off your camera for every shot - it's bad enough having to turn the CPL for the right effect.:crazy:


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## LouieSherwin (Dec 9, 2012)

Another approach is to use the X-rite ColorChecker. Just take a picture under the same lighting conditions and then use the WB eye-dropper to sample the next to last square on the gray scale. 

-louie


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