Mixed lighting quandary

[Tabby]

I'm having issues when shooting indoors where there is some tungsten light, daylight through windows, and my flash - all 3 shining on my subject. It seems my white balance goes a bit goofy. Lately, I have been pretty wed to using the old white card and setting the custom white balance - but I have been disappointed when in these mixed lighting situations.

I've been considering using gels to balance out the flash light. However, my friend said to just get the Expodisc - he swears up and down on the thing.

Anyone have solid success with the Expodisc in mixed lighting? I'm a bit confused on how to take the reading with the disc in mixed lighting? Any better solutions to these white balance problems? Thanks everyone.

[DStanic]

Shoot in RAW and adjust on the computer. :)

[Moppie]

I'm having issues when shooting indoors where there is some tungsten light, daylight through windows, and my flash - all 3 shining on my subject. It seems my white balance goes a bit goofy. Lately, I have been pretty wed to using the old white card and setting the custom white balance - but I have been disappointed when in these mixed lighting situations.



If your mixing light then there is very little you can do, as you will have different colour light hitting the subject in different places and in different ways.
Shadows and highlights can end up needing different white balances to look right.

Setting a manual WB with anything, or even doing it during RAW conversion will not stop this happening.

The only way to control it is to either avoid it altogether, expose in such away that only one light source is recorded, or colour balance the light sources using filters.
Of course not all of the above are possible, it is a bit hard to add colour correction filter to a window or a tungston light bulb with out lots of planning and prep work.

[bieber]

I'm having issues when shooting indoors where there is some tungsten light, daylight through windows, and my flash - all 3 shining on my subject. It seems my white balance goes a bit goofy. Lately, I have been pretty wed to using the old white card and setting the custom white balance - but I have been disappointed when in these mixed lighting situations.

I've been considering using gels to balance out the flash light. However, my friend said to just get the Expodisc - he swears up and down on the thing.

Anyone have solid success with the Expodisc in mixed lighting? I'm a bit confused on how to take the reading with the disc in mixed lighting? Any better solutions to these white balance problems? Thanks everyone.

Expodisc is for setting your white balance: it can't resolve the fact that there are three completely separate "correct" white balances in different parts of your frame. Basically, your choices are to either gel the lights, cut it down to one light source, or shoot RAW, do three conversions for the different white balances, and then composite them together. I'd go with the gels, but gelling those tungsten lights is gonna be a pain...

[qtfsniper]

how about using masks in photoshop, selection the different regions with different color temperatures and simply change them?

[bieber]

how about using masks in photoshop, selection the different regions with different color temperatures and simply change them?
Would you seriously want to do that for every single image? We could be talking about hours of post-processing for relatively small batches of photos :/

[PhotosGuy]

or colour balance the light sources using filters.
Put this over the window ...
Gam CineFilter #1557 Filter - CTO/.6 Neutral Density / GamColor #370 Filter - Spice - 48"x25' Roll (http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/166591-REG/Gam_GCB1557_48_x25_Roll_CTO_6_N_D_Spice.html)

...& gel your flash, too:
Gam CineFilter #1549 Filter - 1/2 CTO / GamColor #360 Filter - Amber Blush - 20x24" Sheet (http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/166184-REG/Gam_GC1549_1_2_CTO_GamColor.html)

[jdouglas003]

I'm having issues when shooting indoors where there is some tungsten light, daylight through windows, and my flash - all 3 shining on my subject. It seems my white balance goes a bit goofy. Lately, I have been pretty wed to using the old white card and setting the custom white balance - but I have been disappointed when in these mixed lighting situations.

I've been considering using gels to balance out the flash light. However, my friend said to just get the Expodisc - he swears up and down on the thing.

Anyone have solid success with the Expodisc in mixed lighting? I'm a bit confused on how to take the reading with the disc in mixed lighting? Any better solutions to these white balance problems? Thanks everyone.

Block the window light.

Control the tungsten/flash/camera settings so that your flash overpowers the tungsten.