Winter White Balance

[w7xman]

I have encountered this problem alot...

In winter, I feel that setting the camera or processing the picture to a cooler white balance often conveys a sense of feeling with the scene that I don't achieve with a natural setting. The trade off is that the photo, in turn, looks a bit unnatural.

I would like to hear thoughts on which of these work for you...

Thanks in advance!

Cooler toned...

Natural...

 

[kmorgan]

I like the first one better. I think you can improve it by first balancing the image (getting it neutral in the gray), get the whites closer to pure without clipping them and the blacks more black, then add a cooling filter. I tried 4 variations in Photoshop.

In this first one I used the Auto Color adjustment in Photoshop to do a quicky cast removal, switched to LAB mode and steepened the A & B curves by 20%, then adjusted the Lightness channel for more contrast and added a cooling filter to restore the original feeling:



In this next variation I used LAB mode with color samples on the ice to the right of the big rock, the shadow of the rock, and one on the snow. The ice sample I chose for my neutral gray. I adjusted the A & B sample on the ice to zero, then on the Lightness channel, adjusted the rocks shadow to 2 (zero being completely black) and the snow to 98 (100 being pure white).



This third variation is the previous LAB neutral image with a #82 cooling filter added....



and finally, I started with the LAB Neutral image, steepened the A & B channels 20% for more color saturation and added the #82 cooling filter to that.



Kevin

 

[Grumpy]

So far, this is really an excellent series of illustrations and discussions of image processing techniques. Individual preferences will boil down to a matter of taste, I think. But seeing the possibilities is instructive.

Of Jim’s images, I prefer the second; of Kevin’s I most prefer the second, but find that the first appeals to me, well.

Kevin’s second image stands as my favorite of the whole batch. (Of course, I might come back and look at these tomorrow, and come up with a completely different choice!)

My preference choice probably reflects my long term romance with black & white photography. This image is quite monochromatic to begin with – black, white and shades of gray, really. In my “wet” darkroom days I almost always preferred printing on papers with a neutral to slightly warm tone and phosphorescent brighteners.

I am viewing these on a MacBook Pro laptop, which does not have the world’s greatest monitor for viewing and fine-tuning photos. It would (will) be interesting to check out this thread on a better monitor when I get access to one (and time to visit VFTT from that location) in the coming week.

G.

 

[NewHampshire]

Hmmmm.......I am a bit torn here. The first looks a bit too cool for me, but the bluish tone I must admit does add a bit more snap to the image. The second image looks more natural which I like overall, but it does seem to lack something, a little punch. I would say try to split the difference and use a cooling filter on the Natural version set to a fairly low density.

Brian

 

[darren]

Jim,

It's a tough call, but I am leaning towards the second, warmer shot. The first shot looks like it does when it is still snowing out and the second shot looks like it does after the snow stops falling and the sky starts to clear up. If it had been snowing, I'd lean towards the first one. Since it isn't snowing I'd lean towards the second. I guess you could split the difference as suggested by Brian.

It is a good example of how color temp can change an image. I think color temp control is the most powerful part of shooting RAW and often make adjustments.

- darren