Exercise: Colour cast and white balance.

Outline: 
Part 1:- Find the following outdoor lighting situations and photograph an object, shooting four versions using each one of the white balance options:

• Sunlight
• Cloudy
• Open shade on a sunny day
• Auto

 Part 2:- Find and shoot a mixed- lighting source scene. For example, indoor/outdoor scene at dusk.


I have completed this exercise before as part of 'The art of photography' and the link to that exercise is
here. It has the exact same concept as this exercise and I have completed the exercise in the same manner. 

white balance settings:, auto, daylight, shade, cloudy

These are the images taken in sunlight and they all have the orangey glow normally associated with 'warm' colour temperatures. The shade and cloudy settings show slightly more of an orange colour cast than the daylight and auto settings here. The auto is adjusting the image to give a more neutral colour but I think that either of the auto or daylight setting work well here.

white balance settings: auto, daylight, shade,cloudy

These images were taken in a shaded area on a sunny day believe it or not. They have all got a rather flat contrast between the wall and the bucket and it's difficult to decifer which detail is for what. However, I find that the white balance setting does make small but significant change to the image. The daylight setting here seems to have a bluey colour cast over the image. Again the shade setting has a more orangey glow but I think this benefits the image better. It gives the wall more colour and the bucket a more wooden appearance giving a bit of depth to the image and making it look more natural. The cloudy setting has similar features, giving a slightly less orange colour cast and looking more like the auto setting which is obviously trying to use a bit of all the settings best bits to create an overall effect.

white balance settings: auto, daylight, shade, cloudy

The same colour cast effect as been created by each setting for the 'cloudy' images. However, I actually think the shade setting works really well for these images as it gives a slightly more natural feel to the stones. But as the cloudy setting has a slighty less orange colour cast, I think this works better on the image overall as the shade setting make the flower colour a little too different from the original.

The second part of this exercise is exactly the same as an exercise I completed in 'The art of photography'.
I am going to link you to the outcome of that exercise here as I would only be reiterating what I said in the write up for that exercise.

Conclusion: As this is the second time I have taken on part 1 of this exercise, I am happy to have had the opportunity to look over the importance of white balance again and also through re-reading up on part two aswell. The auto setting is great for certain situations however, if you do have the time, this exercise shows that you should play about with the white balance settings as sometimes the setting you didn't expect will create a better image. I was amazed at the difference the white balance setting made on the dusk indoor/outdoor scene, so it shows that should time allow, dont just rely on the auto setting.