O
2. WHITE BALANCE.
O
ur digital cameras contain white balance software that can help us neu-
tralize the color casts that result when shooting under various lighting
conditions. You can use one of the preset white balance algorithms—like day-
light white balance, flash white balance, etc.—or you can select the automatic
white balance (I personally don’t think this is a good idea, as color is so sub-
jective). You can also set a custom white balance, which can be useful when
working with mixed lighting sources.
The color temperatures of light are described in degrees Kelvin. Basically,
the lower the color temperature of the light, the warmer (more yellow or red)
the light tends to be. The higher the color temperature of light, the cooler
(more blue) it appears.Custom White Balance.
To set a custom white balance, the photographer meters a white or 18 percent
gray card under the lighting that will be used for the shoot, and the camera
uses that data as the standard for ensuring a correct white balance. Some
camera manufacturers prefer the use of an 18 percent gray card in
obtaining a custom white balance, as 18 percent gray reflects all
colors equally. Still other manufacturers prefer to use a white card
when creating a custom white balance. The argument here is that
white can come in many “forms,” hence the more accurate method
of obtaining a true white balance is using a 100 IRE (calibrated)
white card. In theory, white light is produced by incandescent, tungsten, and
even fluorescent light sources, but the wavelengths of all these light sources
are different.64 LIGHTING FOR GLAMOUR PHOTOGRAPHYA custom white balance
can be useful when working
with mixed lighting sources.