M11 White Balance Issue

[Alexander108]

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I was always struggling with WB and recently watched a video by Sean Tucker "White Balance: My (slightly odd) Approach" which I could understand and as I do DNG only, I can always change WB if necessary. So I set my M11 to 5500K. But when I imported the pictured in LR WB was set to 5700K. This is easy to solve bit still: if I set it to 5500K, shouldn't it be 5500K?

Anyone else experiencing this? Thank you!

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[Elliot Harper]

Not sure about LR but you’re sure you not applied some sort of profile while importing?

I'm not sure LR but I use C1, and I also set WB to be always 5500k, and when importing to C1 it’s always 5500k

[Alexander108]

No, nothing that I am aware of. Works fine for the D-Lux 8 and Q3. I need t further scrutinize it. 

[Chris W]

Yeah, I always have my M11 set to5500k. In CaptureOne I select the M11 profile and from memory the WB is not always 5500k, but it still looks good, accurate and it's just a click to adjust it. To be honest, setting the WB to 5500k permanently I understand I'll usually have to adjust it in post.

[Photoworks]

I would not worry about what number you get in a program; you open the same image in 3 different programs, and the number is going to vary. Not only Kelvin, but also the Tint.

[Alexander108]

vor 42 Minuten schrieb Photoworks:

I would not worry about what number you get in a program; you open the same image in 3 different programs, and the number is going to vary. Not only Kelvin, but also the Tint.

Interesting. I googled a bit and it seems the Kelvin value is not directly accessible in the EXIF data. Never occurred to me that it could be that way. 

[Kiwimac]

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Mine is set the same so that it just behaves in essence as if I’m shooting daylight film, which most of us probably did for decades prior to digital. 
 

If you’re shooting RAW it makes no difference really other than the preview in the camera if you bother to look at that. 
 

Most cameras I’ve used make a less than perfect stab at it if left in Auto WB with one exception: the Hasselblad X2D always got it bang on and remains the highest performing camera I’ve ever used in terms of colours. 

[Elliot Harper]

22 minutes ago, Kiwimac said:

Mine is set the same so that it just behaves in essence as if I’m shooting daylight film, which most of us probably did for decades prior to digital. 
 

If you’re shooting RAW it makes no difference really other than the preview in the camera if you bother to look at that. 
 

Most cameras I’ve used make a less than perfect stab at it if left in Auto WB with one exception: the Hasselblad X2D always got it bang on and remains the highest performing camera I’ve ever used in terms of colours. 

I just set to 5500K and shoot Black and White, and never look back at JPG any more.

[Photoworks]

1 hour ago, Kiwimac said:

Mine is set the same so that it just behaves in essence as if I’m shooting daylight film, which most of us probably did for decades prior to digital. 
 

If you’re shooting RAW it makes no difference really other than the preview in the camera if you bother to look at that. 
 

Most cameras I’ve used make a less than perfect stab at it if left in Auto WB with one exception: the Hasselblad X2D always got it bang on and remains the highest performing camera I’ve ever used in terms of colours. 

yes, in most cases, I found that on occasion, like the job I did this weekend, it was very yellow, setting to 800K was not enough, doing a grey card was a great solution.

[Alexander108]

Yes, it's not a big deal. I was just wondering. It is at least consistent. Interestingly enough I had another M11 that had a mechanical problem and the dealer replaced it. Here the value was consistently 5550K, tint +19. With the replacement it's consistent 5700K, tint +17. Maybe I build a preset and set it to 5500K / +10 which looks best as a starting point. 

Colors are generally great. No complaints whatsoever. During daytime almost no need to change WB (besides 5500/+10).

[Chris W]

Of course light in the real world is constantly changing. So if you shoot locked at 5500k, many images are going to have slightly different white balance and look different, based on the ambient light.

[Alexander108]

vor 3 Minuten schrieb Chris W:

Of course light in the real world is constantly changing. So if you shoot locked at 5500k, many images are going to have slightly different white balance and look different, based on the ambient light.

True. Plus: what does my screen show? Is it still calibrated? Should I buy a better monitor? 

My initial question was: Why is my 5500K setting in camera not showing up in LR?
The answer seems to be (not confirmed yet): EXIF only saves "Manual WB". LR does the rest by guessing.

I now built a preset that sets WB 5500/-10 which works great for my M11 and D-Lux 8 as a starting point on import. WB then needs to be adjusted as necessary. As I mainly shoot b&w (now with my M10M) it is not really an issue.

[Elliot Harper]

7 hours ago, Chris W said:

Of course light in the real world is constantly changing. So if you shoot locked at 5500k, many images are going to have slightly different white balance and look different, based on the ambient light.

I would rather control WB myself set to a known number like 5500k, than to trust Auto WB.

[jgeenen]

vor 7 Stunden schrieb Alexander108:

True. Plus: what does my screen show? Is it still calibrated? Should I buy a better monitor? 

My initial question was: Why is my 5500K setting in camera not showing up in LR?
The answer seems to be (not confirmed yet): EXIF only saves "Manual WB". LR does the rest by guessing.

I now built a preset that sets WB 5500/-10 which works great for my M11 and D-Lux 8 as a starting point on import. WB then needs to be adjusted as necessary. As I mainly shoot b&w (now with my M10M) it is not really an issue.

The DNG Format does not save the "White Balance" as Kelvin - instead it stores correction values for the red, green and blue channels. The processing software then recalculates White Balance Kelvin and Tint values based on their internal interpretation. The EXIF values are descriptive only, the true color representation is based on the recipes stored in the DNG.

Technically, software engineers at some point in time decided to use "color temperature" and "tint" to make this more human readable and tie it to the main purpose to correct daylight and tungsten light characteristics. One always could try to simulate the behavior by adjusting the color channels instead (before my M11 WB default had been fixed by Leica, I used curve adjustments to create a similar effect.

To summarize in short - there are no precisely "correct" values of color temperatures and tint values in digital photography. Every manufacturer might have his own interpretation.

By defining a preset in Lightroom, you effectively replace the DNG settings coming from Leica by the corresponding values in Lightroom.