Thoughts on Photography

Getting Creative with White Balance

Let me start by thanking the friends who have shared kind words and thoughts with me about the loss of Lucy.  I still cannot look at her photo without feeling a deep sense of loss.  It will take time. In the interest of trying to deal with this, I thought it would be a good exercise for me talk about something I love to do (photography) and give myself something to focus on that is positive.  So here is a new post created with an idea from a photo class I just finished with Tony Sweet over at Betterphoto.com. 

I wonder how many people learned about white balance the way I did.  It was March of 2004, and I had just received my first digital camera, the Canon 10D.  I was so excited about using this new digital technology, I just put the lens on the camera and began to shoot images in my living room.  Wow!  There they are, my pictures right there on the LCD screen.  I can see my work without having to wait days for a photo lab to churn out my prints.  Very cool!  When I proudly showed my LCD photos to Meg, she curiously asked, "why are they orange?".   

Orange?  What do you mean orange!?  Didn't you mean to say, "that's a really cool composition of the couch."  Or even, "Wow, that wide angle lens takes in almost the whole room."  But no, you had to ask "why are they orange?"   OK, so she had hurt my pride a little by not noticing the depth of my creativity with living room furniture photography, but I'll get over that.  She just doesn't know how to see yet.  I've been shooting images for years, she's an amateur.  But you know what?  She has a point.  Why the heck are these pictures orange?   

And that is the story of how I learned about white balance.  Anyone who has taken photos indoors with standard tungsten lights as the light source knows that even the camera's Auto White Balance setting will produce photos with a slightly orange color cast.  What a frustrating discovery. 

Now it's three years later and I've come to master how to get the right white balance (WB) before and even after the shot if necessary.  In critical situations I use a white card and create a Custom WB setting for the camera.  Most often, I just use one of the presets that my camera offers that matches the shooting situation. 

Well, last month, my eyes were opened to some new possibilities of utilizing white balance.   Getting an accurate white balance isn't always the most interesting interpretation of a scene.  Why not consider changing the Kelvin settings to change the interpretation? 

The Kelvin scale is simply a method used to measure color temperature.  The idea is that changing the Kelvin setting allows you to greatly change the mood/feeling of a scene.  A lower Kelvin setting (smaller number) gives a cooler feel to a scene, while a higher Kelvin (higher number) feels warmer.  These Kelvin settings can be done manually in-camera or after the fact in a RAW converter if you shoot RAW images. 

This concept can be particularly powerful when you have a colorful sky to work with, as I did in this images:

Original, AWB Setting:

Custom WB, Kelvin set to 3000:

Custom WB, Kelvin set to 13200:

Who knew that playing with white balance could be so fun!?  I used to despise the effort needed to get an accurate WB.  Now that I've been made aware of an entirely new set of possibilities I hadn't considered before, I'm really starting to enjoy the flexibility the WB settings give me.  It's like having 100 different types of film and filters inside built right into the camera.  Tony Sweet, a professional nature photographer admits that his prolific use of colored lens filters has greatly been replaced with this method of manually adjusted WB. 

One final note:  If you ever needed a reason to shoot RAW images versus Jpeg, this is it.  Being able to go in your RAW converter after the fact and easily adjust the WB for image interpretation is one of the simplest and most powerful tools available in the digital era of photography. 

"Exposing to the Right" with Spot Metering

Any b&w film photographer who studied even a little about the craft is familiar with the zone system.  Well today's equivalent in the digital photography world is to "expose to the right" of the histogram.  If you aren't familiar with the concept, read the Luminous Landscape article above for a much better description than I could ever hope to give. 

Exposing to the right is often tricky business because of a digital camera's propensity to blow the highlights.  So about four months ago, I read a post on dpreview.com from photographer Tim Wilson on how to "expose to the right" easily and consistently while preserving the highlights.  You will use your camera's spot metering function to do this.  (if you don't have one, then you are probably out of luck with this technique). 

Step one.  Set your camera's metering mode to spot metering.  Step two, set the exposure compensation to +2EV.  Step three, find the brightest part of the scene which you have composed and use the spot meter on that part to lock your exposure.  Step four, recompose and take the shot. 

What you have just done is told the camera to put the brightest part of the scene at +2EV. This preserves your highlights, while pushing everything as far to the right on the histogram as possible. 

This technique takes a little practice, but works like a charm.  On my 5D, I've created this set-up this as the custom "Camera User Setting" on the exposure mode dial, so I always have these settings at the ready. 

Poor Man's Image Stabilization

Lazy photographers all around have benefited from the technological wonder of Image Stabilization.  It's that little miracle we find built into lenses (and some camera bodies) nowadays.  Photographers like me now have yet another excuse not to lug around a tripod.  With the current generation of IS technology promising a 3-stop advantage, who wouldn't want it? 

The trouble is, it's expensive.  In addition, it isn't available on most lenses.  And for prime shooters like me, it's really a rare thing to find.  So, I want to share my alternative for when you just don't have IS available (VR for the Nikon shooters).  I call it "Poor Man's Image Stabilization."  Now, granted, if you are shooting with any of today's digital SLRs, you are far from being a "poor man".  Just humor me on that point.

So here's the trick.  To get a sharp image while hand-holding at slower shutter speeds, you just need to do a couple of things.  First, set your camera's shooting mode to "continuous" so that you can fire off shots in rapid succession.  My 5D shoots 3 frames per second, which is plenty fast enough for this technique to work. 

Second, after focusing and composing your shot, gently depress and hold the shutter release button while firing off 3 quick images.  My experience shows that at least one of the three images will be sharp.  For me it's usually the 2nd image, but sometimes the third.  What is happening is that you are eliminating that subtle camera movement caused by depressing the shutter release button.  On the 2nd and 3rd frames, your hands tend to be more steady. 

Now this is not a cure all and won't work for every situation, but I find it works just as much as actual IS technology does for me.  How many stops will you gain with this technique?  You'll have to figure that out for yourself.  I find I'm easily picking up 3 to 4 stops.  What's really cool, is you can also do this on an IS lens and gain even more than the 3-stops the technology is already giving you. 

Here are a couple of (incredibly boring) photos I shot at the zoo today to demonstrate the point.  I had the 200 f2.8 prime lens on my 5D.  I stopped it down to f/16 to get the alligator sharp from front to back.  This left me with a 1/50 second shutter speed;  WAY too slow to handhold my 200mm lens and expect anything really sharp.  So I just rapidly fired off three images in continuous mode.  Below you will find the first image (blurry) and the second image (sharp).  The third image looks like the second image so I'm not posting it. 

Shot #1

Shot # 2

When you find yourself wishing you had IS or a tripod, give this technique a try.  I think you'll be pleased with the results.