Photographers NEED to try this trick for PERFECT white balance

Can you explain the 5200k WB process... pros/cons please thank you ps fantastic video WB tip, just tried it out - perfect.

Lovely James! Never adjusted WB like this before, will try it, I find at times I get snow-blind in a long session of editing with WB, I often need to go back and sanity check after a break away so knowing 'technical' WB would be great! 🤓👍 Ace tip!
Panasonic seems to get WB OK, also I shoot hybrid so can't really do the 5200K trick. I do remember a few Nikon users doing that pre-mirrorless with DSLRs too.

This is great, had not realised you could do this and your explanation is easy to follow and it works well. Thanks

I love this, never knew of this method, its a game changer for me.

Thank you for a very interesting and useful video.

really helpful trick, thanks for sharing.

Thanks for the great advice, every day’s a school day!

Interesting. You manually balanced in a shad ow area at the 8 min mark, which is a different colour temperature to the lighting.
What would be the difference in using the White Balance Tool compared to your method?

"technically correct" is very wrong in most of these photos. Almost all your examples had mixed lighting and therefore you could have 2 (or even more) technically correct values for your "correct white".
Your white balance dropper would adjust as much based on whatever you decide neutral is.
The real magic is understanding that you usually have at least 2 different sources (Blue sky, clouds, sun and reflections off the scenery) and you're trying to make your subject deliver a message or image inside the frame without your viewer being distracted by colour casts on the subject itself.
By adjusting the way you are, you're going to be inconsistent shot-to-shot. Being happy with one photo and inconsistent is not "good".
Real Technically Correct white balance uses a test card with a ton of swatches and some good software... Colorchecker passport for instance.
You take a shot with it in the frame and it will correct more than just the white point. That would be "technically correct".
You could also take a diffuser, fill the frame with it and shoot the room (gary fong works well for this) and use that to adjust your WB.

Super useful. Thanks for sharing.

I’d never heard of this technique before - thanks for sharing!

Thanks for sharing. I've never heard of this method. While there are numerous ways to get to a preferred WB, this is just another tool in the kit

The method worked great with your images! I noticed that all of the images had white which you could use to set the white balance. What do you do when there isn't white in the image? Does this method still work? If so, how?

The eye dropper does the same thing.

Really useful information, well explained, thanks for sharing. I did find the background music really offputting and unnecessary.

Do you shoot in raw or jpeg ?

Incredible advice! I could not wait to get home and try on some of my photographs and WHAT a difference your tip made in those pictures!

Very helpful video but please ditch the annoying and intrusive background musak. It’s the same few notes over and over and over again. You don’t need anything more than your visuals and voice.

Isn't this exactly what the dropper thing in the white balance tool does?

I didn’t believe it at first. Was watching this about 1:30 in the morning and to give it a go.

WOW. Totally different. Hit reset and tried the white balance dropper. Not even close.

I’m an analytical type so this is amazing. Thanks.

This is one way to color correct an image. However, wouldn’t using the eyedropper in the white balance tool to click on a neutral be much quicker?

James,

An interesting technique, but why not just use the eyedropper tool?

Or you just click with WB point on a neutral target :))))))))))))))

are you clicking some key to reduce temp or not? if yes, tell us the key you used

Thanks. This is great. I checked the WB of your method against the eye dropper tool and the eye dropper is really close, just much quicker getting to within 10%. Perhaps I’m misunderstanding something?

This is the first time I have seen the histogram used to adjust white balance. I also did not realize the RGB values in the histogram would change when the pointer was moved over the image. I noticed you were adjusting the Temp while the pointer was stationary on the image. How do you do this? I like how you made the distinction between technically correct and artistically desirable.

do you listen to the music that you inflict on the view of your videos while you put it together?

I’ve never heard of this technique before. Thanks for sharing! I’ve never had a rule for it, just adjusted the slider to what I thought looked right, which is probably very inconsistent.

Wow , thank you

Great Video

Beautiful!!!
Wonderful Idea 💡 ❤

I just watched your video on white balance I have Lightroom mobile free version my histogram doesn’t show the red blue green numbers do you know why?

you just called her dress white? dude, there is ivory, babypowder, linne, eggshell, pearl, bone, dove, ghost, not just white you noob, lol. anyway you are making thing just neutral , but not necessary correct. maybe use a color checker

From my observation, aligning the RGB peaks doesn’t always work, if one colour is very dominant in one of the either shadows, mid-tones or highlights. I was editing an image taken whilst hiking, and the image had a lot the sky showing. The sky was predominantly blue as it was decently clear day. So blues will dominated the highlights on the histogram - and trying to align the peaks created a massively yellow hue across the image (too warm). So I instead focused on making sure the Red and Green peaks were within 1% of each other, and ignored the blue peak.

So how would you better apply this rule/suggestion when trying to get the prefect WB? Seems like in the end, it comes down to using your own visual judgment.

One thing that someone told me, is to place your mouse on something that is meant to be white, and then make the histogram adjustments that way. By placing your mouse on that white item, you will then see the histogram values for that area - and then simply try and make sure the values are within 1% of each other.

Great technique, is like using the eye dropper but with absolute control. This it's a complement to other techniques like increase the vibrance at maximum and balance the white by perception. Also you have to be aware that this "perfect WB" can be twisted for creative reason or achive some personal style.

can i have the images for practice?

Really usefull

I find that it isn't what's "right", it's what looks good, so as long as your montor is properly adjusted, just play with the sliders until you like the results. With experience it takes about ten seconds on the average picture.