white Balance

[championboxer]

friends..

can i check with you if you use Auto White Balance on your DSLRs?

I am confused...
Should my photos come out as white? or warm as in actual settings?
i.e. if i shoot in a dinner event where its in dim lights... i would use a flash...

and using AWB, photos will be brightened and lights are white...
but i feel it loses the original colours to what one will feel on that actual day

so i changed to White Balance on Flash, and it takes out the whites on the flash on my photos...

It solves my originality of colours but now... issue is... shots are now dim and dark..

so... any advice?

 

[championboxer]

anyone?

thks

 

[showtime]

there is no way you can reproduce the actually lighting conditions if you use flash because you are introducing another light source. naturally, the lightning will be diferent. if you want the natural conditions, use a fast lens and set your iso higher.

if you must use flash, adopt a good technique such as bouncing light of surfaces. this will give you a more natural shot as compared with firing the flash straight on .

 

[championboxer]

roger....

thks

 

[Ah Pao]

I don't know, but I suppose White Balance can also be a pretty subjective thing, given personal preferences. I always like my photos to be a bit more "warm", so I'll rather have my photos biased towards having a yellow-orange cast compared to having a blue, cold colour cast.

If you really want to reproduce the original warm colours of a candlelight dinner, you may want to put a yellow colour gel or cellophane paper over your flash...but I have not tried it personally so I can't say for sure if it'll work.