Correctly Balancing White Balance

Learning photography is a never-ending process. And the more you shoot, the more you learn.


I was invited to two events. One was the Chicago Filipino-American Hall of Fame and the other was the UERMMMC MAA of the Midwest Induction and Dance. I considered both events as a great opportunity to photograph wonderful people and, also, to expand my knowledge of photography.


In the first event, I shot straight on, that is, with an on-camera speedlite with the flash bounced off walls, ceilings, etc.


However, I immediately noticed one problem: my subjects were properly white balanced, but the backgrounds were not. I'll give you an example here:





You can see the difference between the light falling on my subjects from the speedlite and the light illuminating the background. This is because the light from the speedlite has a color temperature of around 5500K whereas the room has a tungsten color temperature (around 3400K).


So, I decided to do something about it.


I got a Rouge Gel Kit. This kit is composed of a pouch, an attachment band, and the filters that you can put on your speedlite.







So, using a half CTO gel (6500K to 3800K) in the second event that I attended, I was able to balance the light from the speedlite and the light from the tungsten bulbs. This enable me to get a more monochromatic picture.





So, if you want to improve your photography, I suggest you shoot more, learn more, and set a properly white-balanced shot.


Go get your Expoimaging Rogue Gels here:





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Event photos made with a Canon 5D Mark II, a Canon 24-105 f/4L lens and a Canon 430EX-II speedlite.


Photos of the Rogue Gels made with a Canon 7D and a Canon 24-105 f/4L lens.