White balance filter/cap or grey card??

[robert]

Hi all,
I dont shoot raw, and want to know if anyone has any views on which of the above works well.

My 400D doesnt have incremental white balance so i have to go with the few presets.

any experience??

Robert

[Yi-P]

Never used a WB cap or filter.. but I do use a grey card regularly.

I find shooting under mixed lighting, grey card adjusted WB and in camera WB are two worlds apart. I also use it to take manual exposure readings, works a treat. It just takes a bit of time and trial/error to learn how to use the grey card.

[gstark]

Hi Robert.

I dont shoot raw

Is there a reason why you don't?


To answer your question, either of those methods will give very satisfactory results, and far better than the standard in-camera wb will generally provide.

Please also have a look at the tutorial on this subject, referenced from our front page.

[Oz_Beachside]

i used auto for a while, until I realised how irregular it was. once i understood what it did, then i used the tutorial on the front page, helped!

just bought an expo disc, and they work great. grey card was a bit irregular for me

[robert]

Is there a reason why you don't?

Actually no reason other than thought JPEGS were good enough for what I do- I do print some A3's but not that many per month- and I thought JPEGS were more easily processed. I normally only take less than a dozen shots whenever I go out so its not a time thing (RAw convertor), just didnt think i needed to.

Oz B- Is the expodisc radically better than those you can get for less than $10 on ebay?? They both look like a filter that one takes a baseline shot to use as custom WB,

Robert

[SteveGriffin]

I have a grey card but rarely use it because it never seems to be around when I want it - does fit neatly into the camera bag. However I recently bought a cheapo WB cap and love it. I looped it onto the camera strap so it is always with me - mostly getting in the way but it is dead simple to use and gives much better results than using auto.

I bought a 77mm cap so it will fit on the front of any / all of my lenses. The smaller filter lenses I just need to hold onto it while I preset the WB