White balance in orange light?

diego1235467

diego1235467

Well-known member
I'm trying to shoot a scenes where A) the sun is giving off a very warm and very orange glow, and B) The streetlights are extremely orange.

Whenever I try to WB using a white card, the colors obviously shift into a blue hue, which I don't want.

How does one perform an effective white balance under these conditions in order to preserve the original colors?

BTW the search function isn't working for me, so I apologize if there are other topics regarding this issue.
 
Try to use grey card. not white. maybe it'll help, or correct Wb in postproduction, add new 50% transparent layer with inverted color of something that should be grey on the picture.

You need to pick up color from frame (select color which should be grey - you ned to make decision what is /should be gray in scene.

then invert this color and make new layer 50% transparency.... mix this layer with original picture - you should get right WB correction. ;) don't forget to set the compositing mode to ADD. Using this method you should adjust/correct WB. Try other settings, transparency set from 10% to 90% - you decide, but 50% should be fine
 
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You need to be aware of where the subject is standing relative to their surrounding. If they're in the shade, their surrounding is of a cooler color temperature than the light hitting them, so balancing to the sunlight will make everything else blue unless it's also being hit by the light. On the other hand, if you're in the sunlight and your surrounding is bathed in shade, the same thing will happen. There's nothing wrong with the camera, it's just the way color temperature works because there's a range of color temps in the shot.

Same thing when balancing to an existing light. Is the light source that's hitting your subject the same color temperature as the light that's lighting the background? If it's not then there will be color changes as you shift the scale, no way to avoid it.
 
Assuming you want to retain the color properties of the light (keep the sunset's warm glow), you could WB to a light blue card and warm up/cool down the image until you get you're desired look.
 
Or set the camera to daylight balance preset and work from there in post to warm up or cool off as desired.
 
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