White Balance Help

[GeekGrl]

I am very new to all this. This is my first post here. I feel like I'm having trouble with my white balance. I need some suggestions on how to take the picture and get the proper white balance, but I would also like some suggestions on how to fix it after the fact.


Nikon D90
Aperture priority
Exposure: 1/125 sec
F-Stop: 5.3
ISO: 250
Focal length: 70mm
No flash

[SusanH1970]

Actually, your WB doesn't look that off. Her skin is a touch cool, you could warm that up a bit in PP.

Do you custom WB with a digital grey card?

[Benji]

Shoot in Raw and after the subject is placed in the exact location the shot is going to be taken, have them hold an 18% gray card in front of their face while you make an exposure of it. Then back in the computer room load the images in ACR, click on the White Balance eyedropper then onto the gray card, then Synchronize All and every shot you took at that location will have perfect white balance. This is PROVIDED the lights you used (whether ambient or flash or both) are identical from shot to shot AND you didn't move to another location. EVERY time you move to another location or change lights you need to shoot another gray card. Of course it goes without saying that the gray card MUST be properly exposed for it to be 100% effective.

Benji

[spham92]

Hello! Since you do not have a grey card in the picture, do you like the colors like this?

[ttosifa]

More important than WB in this picture is that it is significantly underexposed. Underexposure often makes colors look wrong even when they're right. Not to mention you lose a lot of contrast, increase the chance of noise, and so on.

The WB is indeed off, particularly when you adjust the exposure close to something correct. It becomes very blue. You can counter that with a curves adjustment in PS. I don't like spham92's rendition -- the red channel is obliterated.

An 18% grey card will work great. Something that works equally well (except in Benji's opinion) is to use a white card and auto white balance on your camera (read the manual).

Also, if you are into books, "Professional Photoshop 5ed" by Dan Margulis will teach you color correction techniques that are incredible. The book "Skin" by Lee Varis covers a small subset of those techniques, but is slightly more accessible. Both approach color correction by looking at color channel numbers/ratios.

[GeekGrl]

Thanks to everyone and their help. It's greatly appreciated.