Luminous Landscape Forum
Equipment & Techniques => Cameras, Lenses and Shooting gear => Topic started by: cp1 on June 08, 2009, 12:30:46 am
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Am looking for a good white balance solution and considering Whibal, Expodisc and Spydercube. I shoot raw using a Canon and would like to use Lightroom's eye dropper to click set the white balance.
Expodisc seems to give the best overall results but seems most suited to setting the white balance in-camera which is a bit fiddly using a Canon -- I don't want to be distracted while shooting and, other than a quick WB exposure, would rather sort out white balance afterwards in postprocessing. Also, from reading the instructions, Expodisc seems a bit hit and miss in mixed lighting.
Whibal seems a good solution that will integrate well with my workflow and is convenient in size. It is also the cheapest. However, I've seen it suggested that changes in reflections in different types of lighting can give inconsistent results. Anyone had any experience with this?
I've only just become aware of Spydercube and it seems like a clever solution but, other than white balance, I can't really see myself gaining any benefit from its extra features in terms of assessing exposure. Furthermore, it seems lot bulkier and more awkward than either of the other two solutions.
Anyone had any experience with some or all of these tools and can comment on their effectiveness in practice, particularly if you're using the same kind of workflow?
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In terms of the best measured neutrality and high Lstar values, this is by far the best:
http://www.babelcolor.com/main_level/White_Target.htm (http://www.babelcolor.com/main_level/White_Target.htm)
WhiBal's are very good and cost quite a bit less (they also have a number of differing sizes which is nice).
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I shoot all our grandkids indoor sporting events, basketball and volleyball,, school and church gyms can really test your skills when it comes to decent WB,, they often even use different bulbs in one end of the gym,, I was sure getting tired of trying to adjust he Kelvin as none of the cameras (Oly E3) various WB settings would work,, talking with a fairly successful wedding photographer using Nikon gear he recommended the ColroRight,, he indicated he tried the others and would still have some issues,,
I purchased one and shot three games the same weekend and what a difference,, I saw it immediately in the first gym while shooting my pregame photos during setup,,,, so quick and simple to use,,
cannot compare the ColoRight to any of the others as never used them but certainly happy whith what it provides me,,
Derry
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I have had great success with the BRNO BaLens. It works really well and it doubles as a lens cap so you never have to worry about losing it or forgetting to take it out of your bag.
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I have had great success with the BRNO BaLens. It works really well and it doubles as a lens cap so you never have to worry about losing it or forgetting to take it out of your bag.
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I use the Spyder Cube myself. I find the additional exposure range options it gives me to be very helpful.
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check this new white balance tool out. eagle i at www.somaprophoto.com
works great in mixed lighting conditions.
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Andrew (Digitaldog):
On the babelcolor sight there's a quote from you suggesting that you not color balance on gray, and with WhiBal cards that's what you do...so what's up with that?
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My 2c's :
- Anything that you put on the lens will make a reflected WB reading, and so will be influenced by the subject color, and won't probably do better than the camera AutoWB. You'll have to point it at a gray card (incident metering) if you want to be precise...
So, it's much better to buy something like a gray card (see Andrew's advises) you put in a corner of a photo... the tricky part being to know how to angle it (just like an incident light meter), to choose the light it will reflect in the (always trickiest) case of mixed lighting.
- If you really want some more precision, particularly with funky/spiky fluorescent lights, you may also take a colorchecker and build a color profile upon it (eg with the DNG profile editor).
(edit/spelling)
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check this new white balance tool out.
Hi Donald,
I'm assuming Michael Reichmann is okay with you advertizing your product on this forum.
Can you explain why you think that measuring ambient scene reflectance says anything about the incident lightsource color? For example, if we photograph a tomato on a red plate, your device measures mostly reflected red with a bit of ceiling, floor, and wall color mixed in. What does that say about whatever color spectrum the main illuminant (e.g. flash) emits?
Cheers,
Bart
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I use a whi-bal, 2x3 inch size unit (older one with 2 greys a white and black). Works fine for me, and at that smaller size fits easily in my pant pocket - handy when walking around outdoors with the camera as it is easy to reach. Came with a lanyard as well though I do not use that with it much.
Regards,
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I'm using a Whibal too. These are very durable and not that expensive.
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Andrew (Digitaldog):
On the babelcolor sight there's a quote from you suggesting that you not color balance on gray, and with WhiBal cards that's what you do...so what's up with that?
Because of the linear encoding of raw data (half of all the data is in the first stop on the highlight end).
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Hi,
I use the ColorChecker Passport. Small, easy, fairly inexpensive to buy.
Prior to my digital era I used a graycard and a contraption with a gray card, black, white, grayscale, and colour separation patches. Not very portable. The ColorChecker Passport fits in a pocket.
There is a review of the device by Michael Reichmann at: http://luminous-landscape.com/reviews/accessories/colorchecker-psssport.shtml
Jean-Michel
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Hi there, not trying to advertise, sorry if it comes across that way. (But on that subject, I'd love to post our company on here as landscapes are my favorite way to escape the 'real world'). The problem with my situation, is since I invented and worked on development of something, I can no longer recommend that something to others because I come across as selling, which of course I want to do, but that's not the primary reason. We spend a lot, (too much) money already in shutterbug magazine, trade shows, etc and would certainly not want to be taken as trying to chimp on some free advertising here. Again I'm sorry for that implication although I agree that it DOES appear that way. Okay I'm rambling now.......
Anyway, as a photography lover, I always am looking at forums and sites to pick up tips just like any one does. My help in developing the eagle i addressed some of the drawbacks to other methods which we encountered on a day by day working photographer basis. Thus the design we use. Using the outside diffuser, and the interior baffle and lens filter design, the eagle i eliminates the problem with reflected light pollution from the surrounding location, and instead uses the actual light that's illuminating the scene to feed through to the camera's internal meter and sensor. With the 360 degree capture of the light, instead of a flat directional capture on front of the lens, it neutralizes any tint to the light that comes from reflecting off the subject and surrounding area, such as the red you describe.
The result is that any colors in the scene record exactly as they are, without having to be concerned about reflections or mixed lighting. The eagle i's job is to neutralize the color of the light, which allows all colors present to fall into their own 'space' without regard to the light being reflected off them. Granted that's the job of any white balance device, but as I said, we addressed the concerns WE encountered with other devices, and of course we like our design :) The other methods available all work in their own way. I'm not knocking any other product by any means.
Thank you for the response, and have a great day.
Donald
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[...] and instead uses the actual light that's illuminating the scene to feed through to the camera's internal meter and sensor. [...]
Oh, you turn the camera towards the main light, then?
That makes effectively a bit more sense (though I feel Bart's question is still valid, particularly if there are many tomatoes around).
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Anyone try this one?
http://www.markinsamerica.com/MA5/CBL.php?req=CBL110
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Seems good advice to me...
Erik
My 2c's :
- Anything that you put on the lens will make a reflected WB reading, and so will be influenced by the subject color, and won't probably do better than the camera AutoWB. You'll have to point it at a gray card (incident metering) if you want to be precise...
So, it's much better to buy something like a gray card (see Andrew's advises) you put in a corner of a photo... the tricky part being to know how to angle it (just like an incident light meter), to choose the light it will reflect in the (always trickiest) case of mixed lighting.
- If you really want some more precision, particularly with funky/spiky fluorescent lights, you may also take a colorchecker and build a color profile upon it (eg with the DNG profile editor).
(edit/spelling)
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Actually you point the Eagle i toward your subject. If you point it to the main light only, the way you would a flat disc like the expo disc or lally cap, you do not take into account any extraneous light hitting your subject. this is the reason for the 3D dome on the Eagle i, to encompass every nuance of light from every angle that hits your subject. This is how it collects the proper ratio of lighting from variable sources, then the grid and filter inside the dome further segment the light and feed it in through the camera lens for a very precise white balance setting in the camera, as well as a very accurate exposure setting for the meter.
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This is how it collects the proper ratio of lighting from variable sources, then the grid and filter inside the dome further segment the light and feed it in through the camera lens for a very precise white balance setting in the camera, as well as a very accurate exposure setting for the meter.
It cannot collect "the proper ratio of lighting from variable sources" when it is looking in the opposite direction. What it does, is collect reflected scene color. That's it, that's all.
Consider shooting a backlit subject outdoors. Since we are shooting in the direction of the sun, your device will pick up the color of the sun. However we are looking at the shadow side of the subject, and it will be relatively blue, and thus will be under corrected when compared to a proper reflected or incident color metering.
If lucky, it might pick up enough overhead sky with a somewhat similar color as the sky behind the photographer. Don't forget that the color of our subjects is a mix of diffuse reflection, following a Cosine fall-off pattern with angle of incidence, and (semi-)specular reflection, following a pattern of angle of incidence is angle of reflection (the color of the reflection is to an increasing amount the same as the reflected subject/lightsource). Some subjects also exhibit a certain degree of tranparency, thus also reflecting filtered background color, and some subjects emit light of a certain spectral composition.
All of these colors can only be rendered correctly if we know the emission color of the illuminant, which is predominantly situated behind the photographer. Color is the filtered reflection of the illuminant's spectral composition. The added ambient light reflection sets the atmosphere and gives visual clues about the reflectance and proximity of the direct surroundings of our subject, it is usually not what we want to totally eliminate (unless the subject is situated close to a brightly colored reflecting surface. But even then remember the cosine fall-off of non-perpendicular light, the front and sides of 3-dimensional surfaces will have a different color (the front surface, perpendicular to the optical axis, has the higher likelyhood of reflecting the correct color).
Cheers,
Bart
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Exactly Mr. Wolf,
(One caveat to your comment, I may have been unclear in my description, but it is not looking in the opposite direction, but the same direction as your subject).
So if you take a reading with the Eagle i, in the same plane, facing the same direction as your subject, since it is three dimensional in design, it will pick up the exact same light, from the exact same angles, in the exact same intensities.
Thank you for helping clarify much better than I could.
Bottom line, it just works.
Thanks again :)
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it is not looking in the opposite direction, but the same direction as your subject
You do mean that you turn it towards the light, then?
(Sorry if I seem a bit understanding-impaired, but english is definitely not my mother language :-[ )
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Ha Ha, I understand the impaired part. I've been told I explain things as clear as mud.
Okay let's see, if you stand where your subject is, your mainlight is to the right of your subject, and a fill light is to the left of your subject, you point the Eagle i toward the spot you will be in when you make the photograph. With the dome shape, it will pick up the main light, fill light, as well as any extraneous light coming from any other direction. If you point a device only toward the light, you don't get the readings from the other light sources. The patent pending aspects of the Eagle i, (plug :) one being the dome, allow it to read all the light, not just one light direction.
Of course, if you are outside on an overcast day, just for example, the light is the same pretty much everywhere. So just take your reading from where you are, cause it's the same light on your camera as it is on the scene in front of you. The bottom line is, you want the Eagle i to be in the same light as your subject when you make your exposure and white balance reading. The direction it's pointing isn't that critical due to the shape and filter inside the dome. It's very very user friendly by design.
Thanks for the great comments
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Since we're on the subject. My D700 has a K setting for WB. From 2500 to 10000. I cannot figure out the logic of the step intervals but they seem smoothly gradual from very cool (2500K), to very warm (10000K). This can be seen and set visually by using Live View. My question: do any of the third part WB tools (Expodisc. Eagle i etc.) or for that matter, Preset Manual, set the camera WB at a different shade than any of the values on the D700 K scale?
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That's a great question. The Kelvin temperatures you are talking about are designated to specific lighting shades, you might say, just like fahrenheit and celcius are designated to specific hot and cold temperatures. In other words, 5000 degrees kelvin is the same color light no matter what it's coming from.
The pre-set white balances in your camera are set to certain kelvin temperatures, and they are pretty close, actually closer than auto usually is. The problem is, even though the incandescent setting in your camera might be 2500 degrees kelvin from the factory, in reality an incandescent bulb could be anywhere from 2200 degrees to 2700 degrees more or less, and even that changes as the bulb gets hotter or older. The factory presets are an average for the settings they represent.
What a custom white balance does is set the camera white balance to the exact lighting that's present. This is why an accurately calibrated white balance tool is so important. Most gray cards, especially the cheapos, are actually made to meter from, as the color of them is not consistently 18% true gray, so they will skew a white balance setting, even though they can help you set a proper exposure. It takes time to develop and consistently manufacture a properly calibrated white balance tool, but the results will be right on and the cost of a good tool is quickly made up for in the time you save in post processing. You can't add any time to your day, or your life, so why spend the fixed amount you have fixing what should have been right straight from the camera?
I hope this helps a little. Again, excellent question.
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Since we're on the subject. My D700 has a K setting for WB. From 2500 to 10000. I cannot figure out the logic of the step intervals but they seem smoothly gradual from very cool (2500K), to very warm (10000K). This can be seen and set visually by using Live View.
Hi Carlo,
Those are the settings to simulate an incandescent light source as the main lightsource with different temperatures (expressed in degrees Kelvin). Lower temperarure lightsources emit mostly longer wavelengths (IR and Red), and very little Green, and even less Blue. So a 'Reddish' lightsource will be compensated for by a 'cooler' rendering. As the incandescent lightsource temperature goes up, the proportion of Blue lightwaves in the mix will increase, and the camera will compensate with a 'warmer' rendering. BTW, note that what we casually call cooler and warmer light, is in fact the opposite of what actually happens when measured in physical temperatures, hence some confusion.
My question: do any of the third part WB tools (Expodisc. Eagle i etc.) or for that matter, Preset Manual, set the camera WB at a different shade than any of the values on the D700 K scale?
No, not really. The spectral composition of an incandescent light source of a given temperature is pretty well defined with the concept of Black Body radiation. What these light integrating devices do is take a weighted sample of all light colors covered by the acceptance angle of the device, and that includes all sorts of reflected ambient light (not just from the main source of light, but also floors/grass, walls, and ceilings/sky, with or without optical brighteners in clothing or paint). The camera's Raw converter however calculates it's color conversions based on the Kelvin temperatures (or the mixed spectrum approximation of fluorescent lights). So there can only be an approximation of the correct lightsource color temperature from such integrating devices at best, although one can get lucky. The analysis is complicated by the fact that a digital camera only compares the spectral composition of light in 3 broad (partially overlapping) spectral bands, which is not all that accurate for characterizing the lightsource spectrum.
The only thing that guarantees neutral White Balance under these less than ideal circumstances is a measurement at the subjects position, in the direction of the camera. The simplest way to achieve that is with a tool like a good grey card, e.g. the WhiBal. It allows to get perfect results when postprocessing Raw files. A larger size grey card can also be used to automatically set the Custom White Balance in many cameras, which has the benefit of improved color rendering of the thumbnails of Raws, and in camera JPEGs.
Cheers,
Bart
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Because of the linear encoding of raw data (half of all the data is in the first stop on the highlight end).
I'm puzzled; why do you think this is relevant in this context?
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Thanks to Mr. Wolf,
Note the comment, "only can be accurate at the subject position, aiming back toward the camera". This is how the Eagle i and Expodisc both work. His observation is spot on, as is the science lesson for the day. :) Also, to EJMartin, I agree. somehow we are off chasing rabbits now.
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Because of the linear encoding of raw data (half of all the data is in the first stop on the highlight end).
I'm puzzled; why do you think this is relevant in this context?
This has to do with the Digitaldog's theory on exposing to the right that half of the possible levels are in the brightest f/stop of a digital exposure. Of course, all of those levels can not be resolved because of shot noise, but nonetheless one will obtain a better signal:noise with a higher exposure. If one includes the white balance card in the scene and exposes to the right at base ISO with a camera having a full well of 40,000 e- the S:N would be 190:1 with a card reflecting 90% and 85:1 with an 18% card (taking only shot noise into account). Of course, one would not use a single pixel for a WB reading but more likely the average of hundreds of pixels. If one is using high ISO, the S:N would be much lower.
Another way to determine WB is to expose a neutral card that fills the frame to determine a peset WB. If one exposes according to the light meter, the sensor saturation will be in the range of 12-18% regardless of the reflectance of the card, depending on the calibration of the system. My Nikon D3 automatically bumps up the exposure and the manual states that one can use a white or gray card.
Using the MacBeth color checker with ACR, it is recommended to use the 2nd brightest neutral square for WB. The brightest square is not spectrally neutral. With the D3 at base ISO, I find that I can get good WB with darker patches. ACR will not allow WB from an area exceeding a certain luminance, since it is possible that some channels might be clipped.
Regards
Bill
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In other words, 5000 degrees kelvin is the same color light no matter what it's coming from.
Any value specified in degrees Kelvin is a range of colors. Many colors of white correlate to 5000K. IOW, its somewhat ambiguous. See the line running from the green to magenta axis that says 5000? ANY color along that line could be properly defined as 5000K.
(http://digitaldog.net/files/LinesOfCCT.jpg)
What a custom white balance does is set the camera white balance to the exact lighting that's present.
IF the camera had some kind of Spectrophotometer or could measure the SPD of the illuminant, that would be the case.
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Using the MacBeth color checker with ACR, it is recommended to use the 2nd brightest neutral square for WB. The brightest square is not spectrally neutral.
Also because depending on the product making the DNG profile, it might pop an error (too bright).
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The rockstar Flash on your site ensured I went no further.
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Hey medium cool.
HaHa, I have to agree on the rockstar flash thing, even though I own the company. (I'm 50 and feel like somewhere along the line I lost grip with something). I asked the web kids why they couldn't put on some blues or at least classic rock, but oh well.
That brings up an interesting point though. When I go to a website and music is going, especially the sappy music most portrait studios have on their opening page, I frantically hunt the mute button. How does everyone feel about flash and music on a web site? I'd like to know for our own site.
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Hey medium cool.
HaHa, I have to agree on the rockstar flash thing, even though I own the company. (I'm 50 and feel like somewhere along the line I lost grip with something). I asked the web kids why they couldn't put on some blues or at least classic rock, but oh well.
That brings up an interesting point though. When I go to a website and music is going, especially the sappy music most portrait studios have on their opening page, I frantically hunt the mute button. How does everyone feel about flash and music on a web site? I'd like to know for our own site.
I have taught multimedia and made websites, and am older than 50!
Since it is a business, anything added to your (or any other’s) site scope should have to justify its existence in improving the experience and/or aiding access.
Flash sometimes has its place for heavily-interactive sites, particularly those very much about music and video, but for general usage, HTML5 can do a surprising amount of animation and interactivity, and such sites will work on iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. If you use Flash only, you will not have these people as visitors.
People diss Steve Jobs for not supporting Flash on iDevices; I agree with him, as I have still to see any portable device run Flash well without slowing everything to a crawl and stunting battery life. And it’s crap on the Mac too, sucking up CPU time and threads.
Your “web kids” (or at least one of them) is/are proficient in Flash (hey, I used to teach this too) and therefore would feel impelled to use Flash whether it makes sense or not. I sense reversed baseball caps here, but that’s a cliché …
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Hi,
There are a couple of reasons to avoid Flash, one is that some of disable it! Flash can really suck down a computer and you may even not know that it is running.
The other things is that if I check out a website it perhaps has my attention for seven seconds. So do you want to show some relevant information in those seven seconds so I stay around reading it or have me waiting for some Flash application to load.
Best regards
Erik
Hey medium cool.
HaHa, I have to agree on the rockstar flash thing, even though I own the company. (I'm 50 and feel like somewhere along the line I lost grip with something). I asked the web kids why they couldn't put on some blues or at least classic rock, but oh well.
That brings up an interesting point though. When I go to a website and music is going, especially the sappy music most portrait studios have on their opening page, I frantically hunt the mute button. How does everyone feel about flash and music on a web site? I'd like to know for our own site.
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OK guys, thanks for the info. It makes sense that if one is not selling music or music related stuff, nor are they selling a service that the music would invoke a mood or feeling, that music wouldn't have a place on the website. (Plus the fact that is slows down a computer). I have removed the flash intro from the website. The products are photography tools, and there's no mood that needs to be generated. It's point blank products, that either work or not.
Now go look at our website, and don't worry about being bombarded with metal. (Personally I'm a big John Lee Hooker fan).