So far I haven't done any color grading or any serious video post processing. I wonder do people use color calibration cards? Sounds like a straightforward way to get colors twisted by the usually non-ideal absorbance conditions.

Something like this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/DGK-Color-Tools-DKK-Calibration/dp/B00AWT2QCE

Are there underwater-friendly models or shall I keep it in a waterproof pouch?

My question is how you would use this? The cameras that I have used simply have a white balance button, and I simply reference off my white fins if I use it. Are you thinking of taking a shot of the card at the beginning of a clip and then using your post processing software on that clip? Perhaps I misunderstand your question or how you would use such a card, and I apologize if so.

1 hour ago, SwiftFF5 said:

My question is how you would use this? The cameras that I have used simply have a white balance button, and I simply reference off my white fins if I use it. Are you thinking of taking a shot of the card at the beginning of a clip and then using your post processing software on that clip? Perhaps I misunderstand your question or how you would use such a card, and I apologize if so.

Some software, like DaVinci Resolve, has a function where you can set colours using a colour checker, which helps establish accurate colour values.

Here is the process:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mao2HSKxMkY

Underwater, where colours are filtered anyway, it seems a bit overkill to aim for colour accuracy rather than visually pleasing results. For example, the colour grading on BBC Blue Planet is far from technically accurate. That said, some videographers do use colour checkers as a shortcut to establish baseline colour information for grading.

Personally, I use a WhiBal grey card to set white balance underwater, then adjust in post based on personal preference rather than strict accuracy.

Edited January 30Jan 30 by bghazzal

I have only seen it working in a studio, which means in perfectly controlled conditions. In the water, color absorption changes a lot with distance, and the orientation towards the sun changes much more than in the air. A good white balance is more than enough. The goal is to have colors that are pleasant rather than faithful

19 hours ago, SwiftFF5 said:

My question is how you would use this? The cameras that I have used simply have a white balance button, and I simply reference off my white fins if I use it. Are you thinking of taking a shot of the card at the beginning of a clip and then using your post processing software on that clip? Perhaps I misunderstand your question or how you would use such a card, and I apologize if so.

It's not (just) for white balance setting although you can indeed set the WB using the grey part. Real-world underwater video LED lights, even the "high end" ones have a far from perfect spectrum that can't just be perfected by a WB setting. Ambient light is also a mixed bag as in real world water absorption is more than just "red-orange-yellow are gradually disappearing". Effectively, the PP software can use the defined color spots of the card to calibrate the entire image. Similarly to white balancing, besides white, other colors are "moved" to their right place, something along this line: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYmhGkVShSI

9 hours ago, Davide DB said:

I have only seen it working in a studio, which means in perfectly controlled conditions. In the water, color absorption changes a lot with distance, and the orientation towards the sun changes much more than in the air. A good white balance is more than enough. The goal is to have colors that are pleasant rather than faithful

That's a valid point. I see Keldan is selling their colorchecker card, but it obviously works only if the card is near the actual target and as you mentioned, angle to the Sun isn't much different either. Cumbersome to arrange in a recreational dive.

White fins and buddy's aluminum cylinder which is gray. In video mode white balance must be set before shooting. If you really want to get technically accurate colors you can use cheap and large color checker analogues. But I think it would be inconvinient to carry and use during a group dive.

On 1/29/2026 at 4:18 PM, GTom said:

So far I haven't done any color grading or any serious video post processing. I wonder do people use color calibration cards? Sounds like a straightforward way to get colors twisted by the usually non-ideal absorbance conditions.

Something like this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/DGK-Color-Tools-DKK-Calibration/dp/B00AWT2QCE

Are there underwater-friendly models or shall I keep it in a waterproof pouch?

I was an underwater cameraman on Sipadan for many years, chasing guests around and filming them, so I had to adjust my white balance constantly as we changed depth.

The easiest and most reliable method I found was simply pointing the camera at the sand and setting my white balance from there. The sand usually had enough white and natural colour variation to give me a really good balance for whatever depth I was shooting at.

Some people recommend using white fins as a reference. I tried that as well, but I found that balancing off pure white tended to leave the image looking a little washed out compared with using the sand. Using pure white as a reference on land is very different from using it underwater. Underwater, there’s a lot more happening between the lens and the subject—the water column is constantly absorbing and filtering different wavelengths of light, and that changes significantly with depth, visibility, and ambient light.

For me, the sand gave the camera a more natural reference point for the actual conditions I was shooting in. It wasn’t technically pure white, but that was actually the advantage. It consistently produced more natural-looking colours and a better overall image than balancing off a bright white object.

I also experimented with carrying a white board and a dedicated white-balance slate. They worked, but when you're constantly moving and trying to keep up with divers, they just became another piece of equipment getting in the way. If you have the time and aren't worried about moving efficiently, they're definitely worth trying.

For me, though, the sand was quick, easy, always available, and gave me the best results.

Hope that helps!

3 hours ago, Paul said:

I was an underwater cameraman on Sipadan for many years, chasing guests around and filming them, so I had to adjust my white balance constantly as we changed depth.

The easiest and most reliable method I found was simply pointing the camera at the sand and setting my white balance from there. The sand usually had enough white and natural colour variation to give me a really good balance for whatever depth I was shooting at.

Some people recommend using white fins as a reference. I tried that as well, but I found that balancing off pure white tended to leave the image looking a little washed out compared with using the sand. Using pure white as a reference on land is very different from using it underwater. Underwater, there’s a lot more happening between the lens and the subject—the water column is constantly absorbing and filtering different wavelengths of light, and that changes significantly with depth, visibility, and ambient light.

For me, the sand gave the camera a more natural reference point for the actual conditions I was shooting in. It wasn’t technically pure white, but that was actually the advantage. It consistently produced more natural-looking colours and a better overall image than balancing off a bright white object.

I also experimented with carrying a white board and a dedicated white-balance slate. They worked, but when you're constantly moving and trying to keep up with divers, they just became another piece of equipment getting in the way. If you have the time and aren't worried about moving efficiently, they're definitely worth trying.

For me, though, the sand was quick, easy, always available, and gave me the best results.

Hope that helps!

I'm wondering if it worked better because you were shooting through more water and closer to shooting through the same amount of water as you were filming the guests. slates and fins unless someone else is holding them are at a relatively close fixed distance.

1 hour ago, Chris Ross said:

I'm wondering if it worked better because you were shooting through more water and closer to shooting through the same amount of water as you were filming the guests. slates and fins unless someone else is holding them are at a relatively close fixed distance.

Yes, very interesting thought. On quite a lot of cameras you do need to fill the WB calibration square/rectangle completely to get an accurate balance, which is why a larger slate at arm's length is quite common.
I really like this contraption here: https://waterpixels.net/forums/topic/3745-sony-fx5-released/#findComment-26786

There were multiple WB threads on Wetpixel back in the heydays of underwater video, and yes, sand usually works quite well as it covers a large enough area for calibration. But it also depends on the type of sand. I've had very mixed results with brown/muddy sand, and black volcanic sand is also a no-go.

Another recommendation that came up a lot, especially from Nick Hope who did a lot of testing at the time, was using the palm of your hand as a WB reference.

Edited August 19Aug 19 by bghazzal

11 hours ago, bghazzal said:

Yes, very interesting thought. On quite a lot of cameras you do need to fill the WB calibration square/rectangle completely to get an accurate balance, which is why a larger slate at arm's length is quite common.
I really like this contraption here: https://waterpixels.net/forums/topic/3745-sony-fx5-released/#findComment-26786

There were multiple WB threads on Wetpixel back in the heydays of underwater video, and yes, sand usually works quite well as it covers a large enough area for calibration. But it also depends on the type of sand. I've had very mixed results with brown/muddy sand, and black volcanic sand is also a no-go.

Another recommendation that came up a lot, especially from Nick Hope who did a lot of testing at the time, was using the palm of your hand as a WB reference.

Exactly. At the end of the day, you have to use what’s available in front of you and, more importantly, what you’re comfortable with and what gives you the best results for your particular camera and footage.

Every underwater environment is different. Depth, visibility, ambient light, water colour, and even the type of bottom you’re shooting over can affect the image. What works perfectly in one location might not give you the same result somewhere else.

There isn’t just one “right” way to do it. It’s about understanding your camera, understanding the environment you’re working in, and finding a method that consistently gives you the look you want.

With cinema cameras, you generally approach white balance a little differently. Instead of pointing the camera at something white and hitting a white-balance button, you can work directly with colour temperature in Kelvin and adjust it in-camera to get the look you want.

For example, you can move between roughly 5600–6000K for daylight and 3200K for tungsten and immediately see how that changes the colour of the image. Underwater, you can adjust the Kelvin value as conditions change with depth and available light.

With a RED camera shooting REDCODE RAW, you also have a lot more flexibility in post. White balance is stored as metadata rather than being permanently baked into the RAW image data, so if your colour temperature was a little off while shooting, you can make substantial adjustments afterwards without treating it like a correction to an already baked-in image.

That flexibility is one of the big advantages of shooting RAW underwater, where colour and light can change dramatically as you move through different depths and conditions.

Playing with MWB we soon realized that adjusting WB and setting the temperature in Kelvin are not the same thing. Manual WB adjusts both the temperature and the tint. Then unfortunately with a standard codec (H.264, H.265 etc) the values are baked into the video, while with raw they are simple metadata that you can change in post. The great thing about RAW is that in post, besides adjusting the temperature, you can also adjust the tint, which is the green magenta axis.

There is always the obstacle of storage space, which costs a lot. And with the current RAMageddon...

P.S.

The Sony X-OCN LT raw codec is impressive. It has a bitrate comparable to ALL-I H.265 codecs.