Photo Temp

[JuStDaVe]

What temp should i set my 20d for the real orange/yellow street lights.... driving me crazy.

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Thanks in advance

Dave

[tim]

Just set it to tungsten or auto and take the photo in RAW, you can correct it later.

[JuStDaVe]

i never shoot raw and tungstan isnt enough still orange drives me crazy

[pcasciola]

Use custom white balance then if you don't want to shoot RAW. Works pretty well but RAW is better. Just make sure you take a picture of something gray or truly white when you set it up. Take a few seconds.

[robertwgross]

What temp should i set my 20d for the real orange/yellow street lights.... driving me crazy.

Dave, you don't know what kind of lights they are, so picking some white balance setting at random may not get good results. They might be sodium vapor or something similar. The best bet is to set a custom white balance, because it can handle anything.

If it is a sodium vapor lamp, don't do the custom white balance when the lamp first fires up. It goes through a color changing process for a minute or two until it gets hot and stabilizes. Then do the custom white balance set.

---Bob Gross---

[PhotosGuy]

If it is a sodium vapor lamp These only have a couple lines in the yellow region of the spectrum, so expect some interesting results with any WB. You might consider converting the pics to B&W after.

[robertwgross]

Yes, ordinary sunlight has a very broad spectrum of colors, forming what we call "white light".

An ordinary tungsten filament light bulb has a different center temperature/color, but it still has a broad spectrum, so a camera can figure out a white balance there, maybe not quite so accurately.

When you get over to fluorescent bulbs, it begins to get a little tougher. They have unpredictable spectra and vary a lot with the power line current (not so much on voltage). Plus, sometimes they flicker.

When you get to something like a sodium vapor or mercury vapor lamp, you are getting into a rough field. As was stated, often they have a very narrow spectrum of light, and even a good digital camera might struggle to try to automatically figure out what is really white. That is a good case for using custom white balance.

This is evidenced if you see a sodium vapor street light on a dark night. You can easily see an auto in that light, and you can easily see details in the shape of the auto. However, it becomes difficult to identify the actual color of the auto. It might be black or green or blue. Maybe the human eye needs to have some auto white balance feature surgically implanted.

---Bob Gross---

[kawter2]

I really like Kelvin. try 3400 (play with it to suit your needs

[robertwgross]

Does Kelvin post in this forum?

Seriously, though. Kelvin is convenient for some users, since it is just a straight scale of numbers. Unfortunately, the human eye/brain are not very well calibrated for Kelvin.

Personally, I am more of a Rankine guy.

---Bob Gross---

[Jon, The Elder]

Yes Robert- at times you are kinda rank. But aren't we all?

[robertwgross]

Are we talking about Absolutes here? That will become a heated discussion.

---Bob Gross---

[PhotosGuy]

Are we talking about Absolutes here? That will become a heated discussion. Getting a bit obscure there, Bob! ;-)

[kawter2]

Does Kelvin post in this forum?

Seriously, though. Kelvin is convenient for some users, since it is just a straight scale of numbers. Unfortunately, the human eye/brain are not very well calibrated for Kelvin.

Personally, I am more of a Rankine guy.

---Bob Gross---

WTF was that???!?!?!....

[Jon]

Can we zero out these side discussions and get back on topic?

Unfortunately most street lighting (like all too many gyms) is some form of sodium (as noted above) or mercury vapor lighting, and it's got a horrendous discontinuous spectrum. As Bob said, go with CWB if you even suspect that either of these lights may be present.

[Jesper]

Even with custom white balance you're not going to get great colours under a sodium or mercury vapour lamp!

Try taking some colourful objects under such a lamp. Even when you look at them with your own eyes you will see that the colours will look strange. The light has such a narrow spectrum that it's just impossible to see colours well.

[Jon]

No, CWB won't be perfect, but it's miles/kilometres better than whatever's in second place for that.

[Todd Jacobsen]

Recommend using grey card (WhiBal or Greta) to set appropriate WB. Get in position to take the shot and either take a shot of the WhiBal prior to your shoot or right after the shoot is over. Since it is at night, before/after will not matter.

[PhotosGuy]

Gray Card…White Paper. What’s best?
http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=58677

[froman98]

Does Kelvin post in this forum?

Seriously, though. Kelvin is convenient for some users, since it is just a straight scale of numbers. Unfortunately, the human eye/brain are not very well calibrated for Kelvin.

Personally, I am more of a Rankine guy.

---Bob Gross---

I think I saw Kelvin at 7-11 last week. He was buying tons of beer.