White Balance

OK, I'm getting whacky colors using a WhiBal card too.

If the color uniformity of one or two of the cards is "off" how the heck does C1 or Adobe Raw get it right? I can get near perfect color balance using either grey card or the black card in Capture One or Adobe Raw.

I think this is a bug.

Well, using Photoshop CS alone, no Aperture involved, and the Original image posted for this thread, I can show that the WhiBal cards are not consistent with each other... Yes, using one of the gray cards does make the photo look great, but it also makes the white card look off, because it apparently is.

G5 dual 2.0

Jack,

good research! I was getting worried before. Sounds like it's not Aperture's fault here.

Thanks!

Devon

OK - I'm converted now, but there are TWO issues here, not just Aperture. I'm convinced that WhiBal's white is indeed off enough to irk some of us, but secondly, Aperture is doing something with reds, and this is how to describe it using the Original posted for this thread:

1. If you open the Original in Photoshop CS and set the gray Level to the middle gray card, then the dropper will reveal the white card to be too blue.

2. We know from WhiBal's own website (link above) that too blue is TRUE.

3. Now open the Original in Aperture, and set white balance via the middle gray card.

4. Export the resulting version, and open it in Photoshop.

5. Photoshop dropper should show that Aperture successfully set the middle gray card to a balanced value, such as 141,141,141, BUT the white card will now be too RED by a margin of about 20 points in my repeated experience... Aperture should be making the WhiBal show an excess of blue, like PS CS does, because we know that to be reality.

There you go... WhiBal white is too blue, and Aperture is adding some red.

G5 dual 2.0

Thistledown -

I just metered the Photoshop version you posted, and I'm shocked at how nearly perfect all three cards are in that one. This really shows the advantage you're at testing with your RAW original; best we can do out here is test using Levels against the JPEG, which apparently isn't nearly as good... Your RAW results really damage my theory about the white being blue-ish, which in the end may be a limit of the JPEG as compared to the RAW. Maybe the WhiBal white isn't notably bluer after all, but just in the JPEG. If you can post the original RAW for us somehwere, that would be great.

- Jack

G5 dual 2.0

Thanks for that. From your DNG, I see no more than 3 points variance in any one of the cards when balancing from any one of them (in Photoshop). The conversion to JPEG was cruel to the white card I guess 😀

Well I tried white balancing some more images tonight and some of them weren't as bad. After a little more experimentation it seems that the white balance gets worse as the temperature gets lower. Images with a color temperature above 4000 work better, images below get more likely to not get correct, and images below 3000 almost never get a correct white balance. Since the tungsten white balance on Canon cameras isn't very good, it's these sort of pictures that I need to white balance the most.

Conclusion: It's broken but not quite as badly as I thought.

I don't have the latest Photoshop C2 so I can't
convert in there, but I can in Capture One LE:

Original image: temperature 3700 tint -5 RGB 255,
252, 240
Capture One LE adjusted: temperature 2650 tint -14
RGB 252, 252, 252
Aperture adjusted: temperature 4851 tint +5 RGB 254,
254, 216

This white balance is broken. This is inexcusable in
a $500 product. If there is something special needed
by their white balance it needs to be documented and
there is nothing about it. I'm getting more and more
unhappy with this product. Broken white balance and
exceptionally poor noise reduction. Barely acceptable
performance on a top of the line PowerBook.

Apple fix the white balance ASAP!

I'm having the exact same problem w/ white bal that you're having. My monitor is calibrated w/ Monaco Optix and I have been getting perfect white bal results using Photoshop. I'm totally unhappy! I've tried everyone elses suggestions so far and no luck. Anyone out there with some sound advice please help!

I'm also having problems with the click white balance too. It simply does not work. I've tried everything, WhiBal, Kodal gray card, white shirt, white walls, white piece of paper, clouds, etc. I get a heavy red cast on everything.

The same tests repeated in Photoshop and Canon DPP yield proper results. This has got to be a bug, or something requiring adjustment in the code. I hope it's fixed in version 1.1. Aperture has potential, but this one flaw renders it close to useless for me.

We've just published a Knowledge Base document to note this issue. The document will be updated when new information is available.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=302921

David H.