How often do you white balance?

C

catalyst

Member
Hello,

Having seen the horrors that can result when manually balancing (as opposed to ATW), but not doing so from one scene to another, I'm a true believer in white balancing. But I was wondering how often you all white balance. Only between shots when lighting has changed? For every shot?

Thanks!

Catalyst
 
For me, it depends on the scenario. But at least every time I set up the camera. When doing long form video under constant lighting conditions, I white balance at the beginnig of the shoot.

When shooting multiple scenes outdoors, I white balance before each shot. When shooting sports outdoors, I white balance pre-game and half time. Or more often if it's a twilight game and the stadium lights are becoming dominant (and I have time).

The closer I can get to a real white in the camera, the easier color correction becomes later.

These are just my thoughts. I'm sure others work differently.
 
I white balance once if I am using the same lighting setup (same scene) then again when I change lighting setups (scenes)
 
I use the camera's preset when I completely control the lighting (Tungsten or HMI). Daylight exteriors can vary widely, from sunlight to shadow, by several thousand degrees. Pick one (usually shadow), and stay with it, depending on how dominant that color of light is falling on your subjects (it's generally better to white balance "wrong" on the "warm" side, rather than have your subjects go blue). I generally pick one "standard" white balance for an outdoor shoot and stay with it. Sometimes full shade, or a combination of shade and sunlight. If the sun is setting or rising, white balance every few minutes to keep the sunlight "white." Or don't, if you want the sunset to look orange, like a sunset. I often shoot magic hour scenes on 3200K preset to make the sky go deep blue and the sunset go deep orange.
 
For me, it really depends on the shoot. I do alot of 30 second - 1 minute ad spots where I'm only contracted to shoot for an hour, so I go with pretty much exclusively the presets, rather than fiddling around with customs.

If I'm on an outdoor run and gun shoot, I'll usually WB for the shadows and re-WB every time I see a noticable light shift.

I do alot of sit downs where I use a 200w joker and 56k litepanels for key and fill and with those I'll usually WB through 1/4 CTB, I tried warmcards for a while but they were too warm for my taste.

If I'm shooting a concert/band with stage lights I always just stick with the 32k preset.

One thing I NEVER do is use ATW. that's just bad news.

The next time you order anything from b&h, put a couple of rosco or lee gell swatch books in your cart, they are usually like 99cents and you can get some really cool WBs out of them by just putting them in front of the lens
 
Indoors: Use the 3200K preset if under tungsten or regular house lamps (for documentary shooting). If under fluorescents, I white balance with my green "warm card".

Outdoors: Manual white balance on warm cards (either the back of them, which are pure 100 IRE white or the fronts for effect). I white balance about every 20-30 minutes, maybe more if the conditions change (it was overcast and now the sky is clear, etc.)
 
In theory, before every shot. In real life, before any paid shoot, and if the lighting or location has changed.
 
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