Some questions to ask....


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lawrence90

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May 7, 2008
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I've taken quite a few shots using my new DSLR.

Some shots looks okay while some don't. For example night shots look orangey, which is quite alright but not too good with the new DSLR(still experimenting) but morning shots looks dull blueish, lifeless, which looks ugly.

I use automatic white balance, is it alright to do so or must i do a custom white balance(how do i go about doing this if required?)


Also, does the picture come out better in RAW or JPEG if i'm not allowed to do post processing.

I noticed DSLR pictures come out less colourful that normal digicams.... its the user and not the DSLR's fault right? =/
 

I usually use auto and mostly it turns out fine. Your camera manual will probably have instructions on how to change white balance. You can take a pic in each white balance of the same scene to see how it affects the picture. Since you like warm, maybe can try the daylight shade one.

As for colours, I think different cameras got different levels of colourfulness, but probably adjustable in your camera to a certain extent. Can probably find it in your manual also. Look under vivid setting / increase saturation and contrast etc. Oh and exposing correctly does help with the colours. Are you using Nikon? Or other brand? :devil:
 

you can do a read up on white balance.
Borrow books, buy from bookstore, search on with google. :)
 

I've taken quite a few shots using my new DSLR.

Some shots looks okay while some don't. For example night shots look orangey, which is quite alright but not too good with the new DSLR(still experimenting) but morning shots looks dull blueish, lifeless, which looks ugly.

I use automatic white balance, is it alright to do so or must i do a custom white balance(how do i go about doing this if required?)


Also, does the picture come out better in RAW or JPEG if i'm not allowed to do post processing.

I noticed DSLR pictures come out less colourful that normal digicams.... its the user and not the DSLR's fault right? =/

It depends on the mood you are trying to create. I like my shots warm, so I tend to use vibrant on my d50. My camera is on auto WB most times too. You probably need to do white balance adjustment to get what u want too..

If you are using raw, you need to do post processing. That's why I do raw actually. This is because you would still need to convert to JPEG. If you are not allowed to do post processing, then stick to JPEG. Of course, technically RAW is better than JPEG (which is a compressed file...won't go into the technical details).

Read your manual. You can do adjustments to the settings.
 

It depends on the mood you are trying to create. I like my shots warm, so I tend to use vibrant on my d50. My camera is on auto WB most times too. You probably need to do white balance adjustment to get what u want too..

If you are using raw, you need to do post processing. That's why I do raw actually. This is because you would still need to convert to JPEG. If you are not allowed to do post processing, then stick to JPEG. Of course, technically RAW is better than JPEG (which is a compressed file...won't go into the technical details).

Read your manual. You can do adjustments to the settings.

hmm??

as far as i understand.. warm =/= vibrant..

correct me if i am wrong..
 

well, not all the time, you are able to use auto white balance, depending on the camera you are using. Some camera's auto WB is inaccurate and therefore, you need to check the settings and use the correct one when necessary, and not auto all the time. Know your camera well, shoot more and I believe you will better understand what WB to use in future. After all, you're using a DSLR, try to do things manually instead of auto all the time. =D
 

Some shots looks okay while some don't. For example night shots look orangey, which is quite alright but not too good with the new DSLR(still experimenting) but morning shots looks dull blueish, lifeless, which looks ugly.

Your night shots will tend toward the warmer colours for many dSLRs on AutoWB. For those, you'd probably want to "cheat" your camera a little and fool it into giving you slightly more yellow/blue shots.

Morning shots.... that depends on the conditions of the day. Time of the day is important too. A nice sunny day with clear blue skies will give you very different pictures at noon versus at 8.00am.

Lastly, have you checked your metering mode?
 

I've taken quite a few shots using my new DSLR.

Some shots looks okay while some don't. For example night shots look orangey, which is quite alright but not too good with the new DSLR(still experimenting) but morning shots looks dull blueish, lifeless, which looks ugly.

I use automatic white balance, is it alright to do so or must i do a custom white balance(how do i go about doing this if required?)

Also, does the picture come out better in RAW or JPEG if i'm not allowed to do post processing.

I noticed DSLR pictures come out less colourful that normal digicams.... its the user and not the DSLR's fault right? =/
1) night shots tend to use a warm wb, because your camera tends to be fooled by the tungsten/fluorescent lighting. this can be easily corrected in camera when shooting by selecting fluorescent wb for slight cooling, and tungsten for more extreme cooling effect.

2) your morning shots might depend on how early you are shooting. what is morning here? i don't think you will have "dull bluish lifeless" if you are shooting at sunrise with the sun present in full glory? :dunno:

3) automatic wb is fine, but if you don't like what your camera is giving you, then best not to listen to it, no? you are the owner of the camera, not the other way round. :) alternatively, you can always shoot in raw, and correct it on your computer later.

4) why won't you be allowed to do postprocessing? are you another of the crowd that subscribes to "art, straight out of the camera"? as always, i will express the opinion that any digital image has some processing done to it, whether you have done it in photoshop; or whether the camera has done it for you. to think that photoshop is worse than straight out of camera is equivalent to the chinese fable of the soldier who fled 100 steps laughing at the one who fled 200 steps. and you have the added disadvantage of taking a machine's opinion for your own and feeling proud of it (ironically).

raw is a lossless format, jpg will not be that far off, but it *shows* at large sizes. raw also is a more "malleable" format, you can experience more leeway during your processing when it comes to raw, be it wb correction, exposure correction, etc.

5) well, it's of course the dslr. the makers do have an assumption that users will have their own vision to create. so they would rather preserve detail by limiting the amount of processing in the camera compared to consumer cams. alternatively, if you still believe in out-of-camera shots after all this ranting in point 4, you can always bump up the saturation, contrast settings when shooting. it does seem a tad silly to me though; the only logical reason i would think of this is that you shoot a lot and don't have enough time to custom process pictures.. though every good picture does deserve it.
 

Night86mare..... I shoot out-of-camera leh.... how? :sticktong



On a serious note - both RAW and JPEG are fine. The question is how much post-process you want to put to it. There are those who advocate RAW simply because they do not want to bother with getting it right in-camera, and there are those of the opposite extreme. Whatever it is, it is all up to you, as the owner and user of the camera.
 

Night86mare..... I shoot out-of-camera leh.... how? :sticktong



On a serious note - both RAW and JPEG are fine. The question is how much post-process you want to put to it. There are those who advocate RAW simply because they do not want to bother with getting it right in-camera, and there are those of the opposite extreme. Whatever it is, it is all up to you, as the owner and user of the camera.

:bsmilie: well so long as you know what you're doing, that's the presumption.

yes, same goes for raw versus jpg. if you're a control freak though.. then the choice has never been more clear. on another note, there are advantages to shooting jpg as well that i forgot to mention.. the camera will be ready for the next shot faster due to the lessened need to write large file sizes to your storage (though this depends on the camera model). this may not be an advantage all the time, but can be.
 

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