How can I improve the white balance in my photography?

I am a semi-pro photographer that needs some tips on getting stellar white balance. I use the cannon rebel. I think that my balance is ok, but I look at wedding photos that have stellar colors and I would like to know how to achieve it. Also, is the expo disk worth the purchase price.|||The white balance presets on your camera are not always the best. They can come close, but it will often not be perfect for less than ideal outdoor conditions. Auto white balance usually always works perfectly well in outdoor, daylight conditions out of the shade.





Personally, I keep and use a grey card for situations when white balance is critical. I use a card call the Whi Bal. Here is the site:





http://www.rawworkflow.com/whibal/





I use the studio card size. But at any rate, all you do is take one shot of the card in the scene. I have often had the person hold the card while taking this one shot. This is then used as reference to set correct white balance in post processing. You shoot in RAW of course. In your software program, you will be able to place a color picker or eyedropper on the grey card and click it. This will instantly color correct the photo. You then apply these settings to your other photos taken under the same conditions. Just shoot another shot of the grey card if your lighting conditions change greatly.





You can also learn to do a custom white balance with the camera and a white object. This is a royal pain in the rear, at least it is for me. Canon makes this far too time consuming and button and menu fiddle intensive to be useful to me. Read your manual to learn how to perform it. Why they can't have a simple, quick, one button push to do this with is beyond me.





Using flash can create it's own problems. If you drag the shutter, such as a setting of 1/40 or slower to allow in more ambient light, you can then have problems of mixed lighting sources. This can be corrected with color gels on the flash, but that is a whole 'nuther topic I will not go into here.





The Expo Disc is not something I would recommend. This is also used to set a custom white balance in the camera, so you are still going to have to go through the ridiculous, fiddly hassle of doing that... PLUS... the Expo Disc is an ambient device. You have to go to your subject and with the disc mounted on your lens, aim the camera back at the light source, or more easily, where you will be taking the photo from. So to use the disc, you 1. Screw it on your lens. 2. Do the menu and button push deal to get into custom white balance mode in the camera. 3. Go to your subject. 4. Aim the camera back to where YOU will be standing and take a photo. 5. Then do the selection process in the menu of the shot you just took to select that as your white balance to use for your photos. Have you EVER seen one of these things used by a pro at a wedding? Not hardly, and you never will. It will do a good job, but it is way too impractical and time consuming.





So the best, fastest, easiest all around solution for me has always been to just pull my Whi Bal card out of my pocket and shoot it in a scene as needed, then use that to correct the white balance later in the RAW processer. You can always keep your camera's white balance settings on AUTO. One less button or menu to fiddle with in a stressful, fast moving shoot, the better off you are.





steve|||I will go counter to what most people say. I NEVER white balance my pictures.I use color even if it is ever so slight set a tone. The ONLY time I will use a white balance is with certain shots where the actual color needs to be precisely rendered. To me people that always white balance all their pictures are barely one step above amateurs. Color impacts tone and infliction to your pictures. So do not take that tool away. It is better to know how even slight color can help your pictures. Then the next step is to be able to get that precise color that you wish. I also have a Canon. I am not sure if the Rebel has it but check to see if you can use Kelvin Temp readings.


If so then use them! Experiment to see what they do and then use them. Don't be afraid of using more color then you think you should at first.





If your Camera doesn't have them then use some filters. Some would argue that you can do this all in post but I think that doing it in camera provides a better look. Most of my post work is just minor adjustments.





|||For a good explanation, I suggest going to http://www.shutterbug.com and typing 'get it right in the camera' which will pull up an article by Steve Bedell. Bedell is a professional photographer and his article centers around a photo shoot of a model at the beach during the "Golden Hour".





Actually, just type his name in the Search box and read every article he's written. It will be worthwhile.





*************** EDIT!! ****************





In the Steve Bedell article "Get It Right In the Camera..." he was shooting at the beach during the "Golden Hour" and setting a custom White Balance about every 15 minutes. Since Bedell is a Master Photographer and has written books on photography as well as being a contributor to Shutterbug he obviously has a different attitude about White Balance.





Contrast his approach to Michael L who wrote: "... people that always White Balance all their pictures are barely one step above amateurs." Personally, I'll listen to Steve Bedell.|||I read Steve's answer and laughed when I got to the Expo Disk part. I think it would be too much of a pain to use, too.





I use Kodak gray card. For example, I took a photo of the GC with the same light and I synchronized the white balance for the rest of them in Adobe Lightroom. The lights were the same throughout the evening. It worked for me--and they liked it well enough.





I shot this in AUTO white balance. Tungsten setting did not work well. It never did.





I also tested to see if I click on the white design on the shirt--it worked just as well, too.





http://www.flickr.com/photos/little_pook鈥?/a>





p.s. Someone here actually said the WB of this one is off. (I don't agree.) The original lights were tungsten--photos came out ugly yellow had they not been corrected.|||expo disc i would never use one, read your camera manual where it says how to set white balance and do that,





i find white paper does the trick excellently|||It's called WB (White Balance) on your camera... you use it to set your - now get this - white balance.





Stellar color is obtained by stellar exposure using the proper white balance and fill flash.





One question at a time.|||This should be of some help...


http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=bq3yzTPb1N鈥?/a>