gray card button on SL

[leica1215]

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Im looking to get gray/ white card for white balance use on SL.  there is a short cut button beside the lens on SL for gray card, 

 

should I use gray card or white card for white balance? I have read somewhere the 18% gray card from Kodak is for film, and printed on paper so there will be variations from card to card.

 

are there any "digital use white card for constant white balance calibration?"

 

 

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[JeffWright]

Im looking to get gray/ white card for white balance use on SL.  there is a short cut button beside the lens on SL for gray card, 

 

should I use gray card or white card for white balance? I have read somewhere the 18% gray card from Kodak is for film, and printed on paper so there will be variations from card to card.

 

are there any "digital use white card for constant white balance calibration?"

 

 

Generally, color balance obtained from a white or grey card is "ideal" but not always practical. In other words, there's not a single approach that's right for every situation.There are several different cards available, My favorite is the pocket sized WhiBal G7 card which you can buy from any of the major online vendors such as Amazon, B&H, etc. The X-rite color checker passport is an elegant, albeit expensive, choice as well, that gives you standardized color patches, which have utliity as well.

[Chuck Albertson]

You can program any of the buttons around the rear screen to take a graycard reading for white balance, or you can program any of them to just take you to the white balance options. In the Setup menu, go to Customize Controls/Shortcuts and pick which button you want. You can do the same with the Fn button on the front, and the LV button (the silver one on the top plate).

[thighslapper]

Never bothered with a grey card.

 

Anything neutral grey/white will do ....... concrete or white walls work fine. I'm not convinced the extra accuracy of a proprietary 18% grey card is worth the irritation of carting it about.

 

Another solution is an Expodisc https://www.expodisc.com/ ....... they do one that will fit the 82mm zooms

[Bill W]

I guess I am lazy and just use auto white balance. I shoot raw + jpeg. I can adjust if necessary in post but I find that is seldom necessary with the SL.

[scott kirkpatrick]

I have several generations of WhiBal cards, but they tend to stay in the pack or the drawer.  I do frequently click-balance indoor evening shots for better skin tones, using a white wall plus a little manual correction. 

[Irakly Shanidze]

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If you shoot stills in DNG, don't even bother, as you can always do it in LR. The only instance when I use a gray card is fo video, as there AWB may produce very unexpected results in the mixed lighting.

[lx1713]

There might be a reason to use something other than AWB.

 

Using flash on my SL slows down the camera perceptibly. So following Ramarren's working methods, I used my flash on manual mode whenever it made sense. It was better overall.

Just a couple of days ago, shooting a still object, I decided to dial in the white balance Kelvin setting (basically locking down the wb), to my surprise the camera was handling better and faster. I will test it a bit more before coming to a more certain conclusion.

 

Otherwise, I usually leave it on AWB for general shooting and shoot DNG as many suggested.

[jaapv]

There are situations, like when shooting by LED light, when colour correcting is a real PITA. Using grey card can give a better starting point in postprocessing.. One example being in a restaurant with economy lighting. The AWB will be all over the place, probably yellow/magenta or something like that. Take a quick grey card balance from the edge of the plate or the tablecloth and you'll save a lot of computer time, although you'll have to warm up the shot. It does not have to be a 18% grey caed, anything that the camera can use to equalize the colour channels will do. I normally use the whitebal card in my Colourchecker Passport, which lives in my bag.

[FlashGordonPhotography]

I prefer to shoot a shot with a color checker and then one without. Only takes a second to hold it in front of the lens.

 

The grey card setting, while a cool feature is something I forget to switch off after the shot so I end up with a hundred shots in LR with wonky WB and the as shot version is the grey balance one not AWB.

 

If I were more disciplined..........

 

Gordon