GH5 WB: Kelvin degrees or presets? Which of both can you trust?

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FoxAdriano

Well-known member
Hi, if you had to shoot in difficult environmental conditions and without external monitor, which is more reliable between Kelvin degrees or WB presets? Would you put manually Kelvin degrees (for example 5600K in the day) or would you choose WB preset? Thanks for your thought.
 
I'd pull out a white sheet of paper and do a manual white balance. Better to use a proper gray card, but if it is tricky the paper would probably cover more color shifts than any preset or fixed color spectrum setting.
 
FoxAdriano said:
Hi, if you had to shoot in difficult environmental conditions and without external monitor, which is more reliable between Kelvin degrees or WB presets?
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This is sort of like asking "which is better, oranges or concrete blocks?". Depends -- are you hungry or trying to build a wall?

Without knowing anything else, like how you define "reliable", which camera, what your "difficult environmental conditions" might entail, etc. and I can only pick either a K setting or a WB preset, I would probably go with a WB preset.
 
Bruce Watson said:
This is sort of like asking "which is better, oranges or concrete blocks?". Depends -- are you hungry or trying to build a wall?

Without knowing anything else, like how you define "reliable", which camera, what your "difficult environmental conditions" might entail, etc. and I can only pick either a K setting or a WB preset, I would probably go with a WB preset.
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Ok, you are right, sorry. I always go where there are a lot of sun in the equator. Africa, South America, Far East. I can't to make the manual WB.
 
FoxAdriano said:
Ok, you are right, sorry. I always go where there are a lot of sun in the equator. Africa, South America, Far East. I can't to make the manual WB.
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Why?

I don't mean to be rude but as an instructor I heard a ton of excuses about not being able to manual white balance and in almost every case they could have white balanced and just chose not to. While white balance can be a precise act it can also be an insanely quick and simple act if you need it to be. It seriously takes seconds to point the camera at something white and hit a few buttons. While a white balance card will provide the most accurate results you can use anything white as long as it is the same object. Having the color off slightly due to a slightly off white color will be consistent across your shots as long as you use the same object. Piece of paper, white bed sheet, foam core board, poster board, styrofoam plate, T-shirt stapled to a piece of wood. Can of spray paint on a board. Whatever. Anything will be more accurate than a press.

The issue with presets is they assume the lighting never changes. In a controlled studio environment where you know the lights are exactly 5600k that might be ok but outdoors the lighting can be many different values. Clouds, time of day and so forth. Thats why there is a shade outdoor preset, cloudy outdoor preset and bright light outdoor press. Even though the camera provides three they are just a rough estimate and average of what color temps can be in certain situations. So two shots on a cloudy day could have two very different color temps and yet the camera cloudy preset assume they should be the same. That means every shot is different and you have to manually compensate in post.

Dialing in Kelvin temps is a tiny bit more accurate but they again assume your scene really is that color temp. Plus sensors, lenses and filters can have a color cast that affect the color. Using lens A on a 5600k studio light could shoot a different color then lens B in that same environment. Slap a ND filter or adjust a variable ND filter and that kelvin could once again be incorrect. Thats why manual white balance is almost always the best solution. Every other choice is a quick and dirty compromised solution. It is up to you to determine if a sticky situation warrants cutting corners but in my experience unless I'm shooting a police chase with no warning I always have a few seconds to white balance.

When it comes to white balance it isn't also as if you are doing it for every shot. You get to an environment like in the middle of Africa do a white balance and you should be good for a couple of hours. It takes just as long to select a preset as it does to do a manual white balance. If the lighting suddenly changes like walking into a building with artificial light then you do a white balance again and don't need to change again until you go back outside. The camera can also store a couple of manual white balances. On a shoot I will assess the environments and set my white balance in each environment and then I know I'm good to go. Planning and preparation can go a long way and honestly if you just do it a couple of times it becomes second nature. Saying it can't be done will never allow you to develop the skills and experience to do it as needed.
 
FoxAdriano said:
Ok, you are right, sorry. I always go where there are a lot of sun in the equator. Africa, South America, Far East. I can't to make the manual WB.
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Dead right,on days with lets say sunny periods presets rarely let me down on any of my cameras,manualy changing does more so though especialy wildlife filming when important content could be lost.
 
My answer would be neither because both assume the illumination is perfect. You didn't define difficult conditions which leaves a lot of interpretation. If I was in a fast moving situation that might involve inside to outside or the other way around, I'd try to have a preset for each ahead of time. That said, I do sometimes dial into things like sunny, cloudy, indoor and just deal with the colors in post because I know they will be close.

Back in the day, we had clear filter and orange CT plus ND on the filter wheel, this made it far easier to grab one WB and just rotate through the filter wheel for the second condition. And if you were really in a bind, you could flip the WB selection switch down to preset (3200k) and be close enough for news depending on the filter selected. Not anymore.
 
In my latest trip in Africa I demaged a lot of clips. I was in a indigenous village with red earth and I got many clips with chromatic dominant. It was very hard to correct them in post. How would you act in that enviroment? I'm a lonely traveller.
 
Adriano,

You have posted a lot of questions lately and that is great. Most have a beginning shooter focus. It seems you would benefit from outside learning like some form of a class or apprenticeship beyond just asking questions on the internet. The simple answer to your white balance question is to carry a white card around with you. Throw it on the ground and do a white balance. Simple but it is as good as you can do.
 
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White card on the ground may not account for a cast that is reflected up from the ground. In general I have always tried to put the white card in the same location and orientation as the subject, we teach our students to do the same.

Everyday when I'm checking cameras in at work I see one come back with something like 5600K displayed and a greenish tint, also a few that are more towards magenta, my office is around 3400K with a fairly balanced color. As we all know, when a daylight balanced camera comes back and is used in a 3xxxK environment, you will get a orange cast to the image. So that fact that I'm getting green and magenta say that under those conditions, setting the camera to an "ideal" 5600K would have been wrong.

There are only 3 correct answers:

#1 white balance on a white/gray card

#2 use a color meter and very high end camera that allows you to dial out the extra hues for a neutral image

#3 shoot RAW and handle the white balance in post

There are of course exceptions to this where you might use a tinted card to warm or cool an image, or dial in some offsets to provide a specific look that you desire. I would say those three "rules" apply even when you have controlled lighting, I would certainly check the color temperature of the lights so that I had the correct WB, even if I was dialed in by an ideal number. How often do you get 3000K lamps in a light because someone was cheap? Not as much an issue with HMI. But also how often is a lamp worn and no longer the correct color? I'm guessing in lower level productions that the lamp is always beyond the number of hours for correct color, I know our light kits are pretty much always "wrong" unless I just changed to a fresh lamp. Lamps really are rated for run time to the point of color change, and will generally last a lot longer with the "wrong" color.
 
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Bassman2003 said:
You have posted a lot of questions lately and that is great. Most have a beginning shooter focus. It seems you would benefit from outside learning like some form of a class or apprenticeship beyond just asking questions on the internet. The simple answer to your white balance question is to carry a white card around with you. Throw it on the ground and do a white balance. Simple but it is as good as you can do.
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To carry a white card around with me? Bad idea. I've already done it. It is a simplistic answer.
 
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FoxAdriano said:
To carry a white card around with me? Bad idea. I've already done it. It is a simplistic answer.
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As Greg said, not much more the interwebs can offer you then. Best of luck with your shooting as this will be the last post I reply to of yours! You probably are better off posting images than talking about WB issues as there is probably a language gap going on as well. Your posts are simple and complex at the same time. It is tough to know what you are looking for...
 
I've been using a collapsible white-balance target for more than 20 years now, with excellent color balance results. Have your subject hold the target while you take a reading, so that the same light falls on the target as your subject.

 
An ExpoDisc is a great alternative to a White/Grey card, & what I use for documentary work, but that’s been recommended to you several times in a previous post.

http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthrea...small-size-grey-card-help!&highlight=ExpoDisc

Sunlight is essentially the same no matter where you are in the world, & the only factor that might be an issue is the red dirt you often mention in your posts, but the resulting cast would only be in the fill light, & while it could be fixed by covering the ground with a neutral fabric (black, grey, or white) you wouldn’t want to WB that out. From a creative POV I would embrace the look, & go with it.

Still think the WB presets work well enough, especially if your willing to shoot 10-bit VLog-L, but you’ll need to use you eye, & EVF, to decide which one works best for each shot. Front lit in direct undifussed Sun requires a different preset then filming backlit in the same conditions.

PS there’s a 62mm ExpoDisc that ships from Canada for sale on eBay right now.
 
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I'm sorry if I'm verbose if I often wonder the same question but I ruined my lastest documentary on red ground. Yet I did some tests before going there but they weren't enough. The only alternative I have now is to try an ExpoDisc, but I can't get a 62mm ExpoDisk and screw it up because my GH5 has a lens hood in front of the lens and I can't take it off every time.
 
so, you have a camera, a small folded white piece of paper can not fit in camera bag? Or your pocket? guessing you have batteries in pocket, grab some toilet paper and put in pocket?
 
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