Confusing WB issue w/ pics

I was messing about in the kitchen taking some photos of the dogs (as you do ).

None of the default WB modes or Auto looked good under the lighting so I shot a custom wb using the fridge door, just trying it as I never used one before.

So I set the WB to custom, snapped away some shots and the WB was different in the pictures. These two were taken about a second apart according to the exif. Both in manual, 1/200 f2.5 ISO1600. Anybody know what's going on?

I know a fridge door isn't a gray card but it should be pretty consistent shouldn't it??

Excuse the bad shots,they weren't keepers...

This is due to the fluorescent lights in your kitchen. They "cycle" and generate a different color periodically. Not a whole lot you can do about it, and it's not something you did wrong with the white balance setting. If you were to use a longer shutter speed, you could minimize the effect, but that won't work if you're shooting a dog. So you just need to know under fluorescent lights to shoot a few extra shots to make sure you got the "good" lighting. Actually you also need to double check when you shoot your custom white balance shot that you don't get this periodic dark one as that shot either. That would screw up the majority of your shots.

You could also shoot these in raw, then adjust the white balance later, accounting for the periodic oddball-colored one.

Dave

I was thinking it might be the lights for a second. I shot raw anyway but i like to the the WB at least close in camera. I'll have to try shoot them earlier in the day when there's some sunlight Thanks for the reply.

MobyDick wrote in post #12354303
I was thinking it might be the lights for a second. I shot raw anyway but i like to the the WB at least close in camera. I'll have to try shoot them earlier in the day when there's some sunlight Thanks for the reply.

The issue with fluorescent lighting is one which is very difficult to overcome. If you are trying to use fluorescent lighting that cycles at the power line frequency, then the ONLY solution is to shoot with some very specific shutter speeds that will allow the frame to be exposed to one or more full half-cycles of the power. This is the only way to get uniform color and brightness across the whole frame of the image.

For places using 60 Hz power, the ideas shutter speeds would be 1/120, 1/60, 1/30 and 1/15 second.

For places using 50 Hz power, the ideal shutter speeds would be 1/100, 1/50, and 1/25 second.

Mixing light types is not the solution unless you can totally overpower the fluorescent lights with daylight or flash, for example.

SkipD wrote in post #12354565
The issue with fluorescent lighting is one which is very difficult to overcome. If you are trying to use fluorescent lighting that cycles at the power line frequency, then the ONLY solution is to shoot with some very specific shutter speeds that will allow the frame to be exposed to one or more full half-cycles of the power. This is the only way to get uniform color and brightness across the whole frame of the image.

For places using 60 Hz power, the ideas shutter speeds would be 1/120, 1/60, 1/30 and 1/15 second.

For places using 50 Hz power, the ideal shutter speeds would be 1/100, 1/50, and 1/25 second.

Mixing light types is not the solution unless you can totally overpower the fluorescent lights with daylight or flash, for example.

That is true for situations where the fluorescent lighting still uses simple magnetic ballasts. However, they are gradually disappearing and being replaced by electronic ballasts which are much more efficient and result in more lumens per watt. The output from the electronic ballasts is a square wave with a frequency of several thousand Hertz. You can't depend on the output being any particular frequency since it varies with factors such as lamp type and who manufactures the ballasts.

The worst situation imaginable is to have lighting that is a mixture of fluorescent and something else, especially if the "something else" is tungsten because the color content of their outputs are so drastically different. This means that the shadows of each of the light sources will have a different color. With fluorescent lighting, the shadows are a sickly greenish brown when used together with flash or tungsten lights to illuminate the same subject.

The best possible solution is to turn off the fluorescent lights.

For custom you want to shoot the white fridge, defocused. THEN when you select custom you navigate to the picture and select it and it will set the custom WB based off that picture you used. Always defocus slightly when shooting a card or wall for WB.

Custom WB won't work terribly well with fluorescent lighting if your shutterspeed is too fast, and/or catching the cycling. There can be times where half the image is of one color, the other half a different color.

And during other times where the WB is off, it may be difficult/impossible to fully correct because at that time, the only light output is in that particular spectrum.

The best you can do (nowadays) is to shoot with a slower shutter speed, or bring your own light (flash) if you want more consistent results.