calibrating white balance... is this product any good?

[dalethompson]

I'm always looking for an accurate way to properly calibrate white balance, both indoors and outside. I came across this product on ebay and wanted to know if it would work:

http://www.shootersblues.com/

Has anyone used this before? Is it something worth trying or is it useless?

I'm shooting a lot these days under florescent lights and as hard as I'm trying to correctly capture the right colours, I'm finding it hard sometimes to make them look as good as they could.

If this product is no good, can anyone suggest something for white balance or an accurate way of getting good results under florescent lights?

TIA,
Dale

 

[Hal2]

I use this http://www.expoimaging.net/product-overview.php?cat_id=1&keywords=ExpoDisc and found it works great under any lighting...

 

[dalethompson]

Hal2:

Interesting product for sure! I don't know if I want to spend that much on it (with Cdn. conversion, it will be over $200) but it does look really cool.

I found these too:

http://www.warmcards.com/WC_VIDEO.html

At almost $100 Cdn. they aren't cheap either.


Thanks,
Dale

 

[RyanT]

Why not just get a color temperature meter? Take a reading, then set your white balance to that. That way you can also meter specific lights and make sure you're not slightly mixing color temperatures when you don't want to be.

 

[Allan Black]

I use this http://www.expoimaging.net/product-overview.php?cat_id=1&keywords=ExpoDisc and found it works great under any lighting...

Yep me too, started with the Neutral, great for mixed lighting. Now got the Warm one for talking heads, never fails.

I saw a tip about buying the largest size for all your large still cam lens, but it wouldn't fit inside the lens hood on most vid cameras. So I got the 72mm for the XH-A1s, also doubles as a short time lens cap on location.

Watch out for the Chinese WB caps on Ebay, low cost, low results. Cheers.

 

[Paul Hudson]

I have accomplished the same thing for years by balancing through 1/8 or 1/4 CTB. It works as well and at a fraction of the cost.

 

[Gabriel Berube]

I use the cards that come with the CoverLens (http://coverlens.com/), pretty useful and gets me good WB. At 40 bucks, it's a good deal that doesn't break the bank.

Here's a review by Barry Green found in the articles section : http://www.dvxuser.com/articles/coverlens/