white balance with Tungsten lights -- 7D

G

Gene Sung

Veteran
I notice that when I shoot with lights, the 7D seems to have problems with Tungsten lights. I notice that when I white balance to Daylight 5600k Fluorescents, the colors come out very accurate.

However, white balancing with any Tungsten light, whether it be my Lowel Pro Lights or Cool Light Flos with 3200k lamps, it always come out very cool and has a greenish tint, and is NOT color accurate. I thought it was my 7D, but then I tested the color balance on my friends 7D and it come out exactly the same with Tungsten lights.

The rep at Cool Lights says that REDs and most modern cameras are factory calibrated towards 5600K daylights, so they work well with 5600k and might look off with Tungsten when doing a custom white balance. From what I've seen, I think he's right since I cannot get it to look right.

How can I get a color accurate White Balance when shooting with Tungsten lights? I was thinking about using Warm Cards instead of a Grey Card. Do you guys think that would work?
 
Have you tried using the tungsten preset? I've used that frequently with my T2i with great results. Warm cards are certainly handy for custom WB (I keep a Roscolux swatch book for warm balancing), but I've found the preset to be fairly accurate in many situations.
 
You know what's funny is the when I use the preset Fluoresecent 4000k it looks pretty close in terms of color. But I'm just curious how others custom WB the 7D for tungsten. I think I will try the warm cards.

C2V, which Roscolux swatch do you use to warm up the balance? Do you just put the gel in front of a white card?

Thanks for the tip
 
The T2i and 7D are essentially the same cameras in terms of the image sensor and presets, which is why I chipped in.

I have a white card and use swatches of CTB for warm balancing. You have to hold the swatch right in front of the lens, as small as it is, but you can get varying degrees of warmth if you use different values of CTB. Of course, you can also use CTO to cool balance the same way.
 
Wow C2V. That is a GREAT idea. And that works well to warm up the white balance a bit?

That sounds basically like using Warm Cards, but a cheaper solution. The warm cards are really expensive for what they are. $75 for several pieces of laminated colored paper.

Thanks for the tip.
 
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