RAW editing help

I recently shot an event with a 2nd shooter. Both of us shot in RAW, however I was tungsten white balance with a CTO gel on my flash. He did not have the gel on his flash and he shot in auto white balance. Ideally, I would like all the images (mine and his) to have similar room temp. What is the best way for me to take his RAW files and match the temp with my images. Do I just match up the Kelvin temp on his RAW files to the readings on my RAW files

You could try that, but I'd be inclined to try to match them by eye first. I wouldn't care if they were off by 100K as long as they looked good.

ronf119 wrote in post #14566234
I recently shot an event with a 2nd shooter. Both of us shot in RAW, however I was tungsten white balance with a CTO gel on my flash. He did not have the gel on his flash and he shot in auto white balance. Ideally, I would like all the images (mine and his) to have similar room temp. What is the best way for me to take his RAW files and match the temp with my images. Do I just match up the Kelvin temp on his RAW files to the readings on my RAW files

If he used a Canon camera, his shots will have "Flash" white balance.

Bigger problem is that, depending on flash-ambient ratio, all his shots will vary in white balance: If there's more flash, they will be bluer, if there's less flash, they will be warmer. So if you edit them to have the same "room temperature" by setting tungsten WB, his shots probably end up with blue people…

Yes, shot with another Canon camera with a 580EX II.

I'm afraid i'm probably going to have to manually edit each one which would be quite time consuming

René Damkot wrote in post #14566593
If he used a Canon camera, his shots will have "Flash" white balance.

Bigger problem is that, depending on flash-ambient ratio, all his shots will vary in white balance: If there's more flash, they will be bluer, if there's less flash, they will be warmer. So if you edit them to have the same "room temperature" by setting tungsten WB, his shots probably end up with blue people…

Yes, with one flash gelled and the other one not the light entering the cameras will be fundamentally different. It will be as if they were shot in two different places and therefore the balancing multipliers needed in the Raw converter will be different.

Would something like this work. I take one of his RAW photos, post process to my liking and taking note of both his original temp and new temp I set.

Then for every RAW image, +/- temp numbers based off of that.

For instance say, his RAW image originally had 5500 for temperature and I found that 3200 looks similar to my own camera image. Now his next photo had 5700 for temperature (+200), can I set the new temperature to be 3200+200=3400 and be pretty consistent on white balance color with all his images?

You won't easily be able to make the images look the same since you gelled your flash. With LR4/CS6 you can paint in the WB on the subject or background to make them match, but it's a time intensive job.

Best capture the images consistently next time.

Take one of his shots, and adjust the White Balance to be as close to yours as you can. Then, Select All, or, if yours are mixed with his, you could Sort by File Name, then you'll need to select all of his images.

When you do this the White Balance ID will show as "Custom".

Then, Select All, or, if yours are mixed with his, you could Sort by File Name, then you'll need to select all of his images.

Make sure the image you "corrected" is the "active" image and then click Sync at the lower right panel. You can Check None, then select the White Balance option, click Synchronize, and all his pics should get the same WB.

tonylong wrote in post #14569963
and all his pics should get the same WB.

… Which still may lead to different looking images if the flash-ambient ratio varies…

René Damkot wrote in post #14571829
… Which still may lead to different looking images if the flash-ambient ratio varies…

True, but it would at least give a good "starting point"!

Really, there is not a "correct" white balace for a blending of flash and ambient, just a "pleasing" balance. Setting one "general" setting may actually be fine for the batch!

tonylong wrote in post #14569963
Take one of his shots, and adjust the White Balance to be as close to yours as you can. Then, Select All, or, if yours are mixed with his, you could Sort by File Name, then you'll need to select all of his images.

When you do this the White Balance ID will show as "Custom".

Then, Select All, or, if yours are mixed with his, you could Sort by File Name, then you'll need to select all of his images.

Make sure the image you "corrected" is the "active" image and then click Sync at the lower right panel. You can Check None, then select the White Balance option, click Synchronize, and all his pics should get the same WB.

thanks. I assume your method above is using lightroom 4? I'll have to check it out. Prepping my stuff for a retirement party and a wedding this weekend so I probably won't get back to editing those pics until Sunday

tonylong wrote in post #14571924
True, but it would at least give a good "starting point"!

Really, there is not a "correct" white balace for a blending of flash and ambient, just a "pleasing" balance. Setting one "general" setting may actually be fine for the batch!

yep, i just need a starting point. I still plan on post processing but was hoping to apply a setting that would getting me a better starting point position