White balance Underwater

Hi there

I'm quite new to underwater photography and I seem to have problems with the white balance settings to get accurate colors in my pictures.

I have a Nikon D7100 with a Sea & Sea YS-D1 strobe and a Sola Video 2100. I normally use it in TTL mode and I tried the white balance settings in auto, color temperature and flash but my pictures still come very blue.

I tried to use a red filter but everything is red then and I don't really know if this is because the camera has a red filter in or for another reason.

Is there anyone out there who can help me a little with this settings problems??

Thank you in advance

Dilma, not sure what the problem is but first check your setup on land and try taking a picture less than 1 ft away from the lens with the strobe in different positions. Check the histogram.You also didn't mention your settings and most UW photographers shoot manual. You adjust you F stop based on the distance from the subject. ISO normally 200. The higher the shutter speed, the darker the background.

Keep in the mind that rules on how colour is lost at depth applies to any direction the light travels vertically or horizontally either ambient or from your flash.

Normally, I use auto white balance but have my Olympus E-PM1 also set to work WB with my strobe. I also have the flash compensation at -2 EV so the camera uses more flash than ambient.

The trick is, get in close and shoot up.

Hey Dilma

You might like to post some pics then we can take a look. Much depends on the depth, the settings you use on your camera and the setting and positioning of your strobes - and then whether you are shooting WA or macro: I presume WA.

There is another thread running on the same issue - where a number of us have suggested shooting in RAW (which you can do with your D7100) and then sorting out the problem in, say, Lightroom.

But, as I say, if you want to attach some pics it'd give us a better idea of the issue and we might be able to help more.

Have you got an Ikelite underwater housing? It tells you how to set up your camera in the manual. You have to enable/disable certain functions to get good quality images. Good luck.

Good question.

If its TTL then quite possibly its choosing to use too much ambient light and not enough strobe and the result is a blue/green washed out image lacking in colour.

Try it manual without TTL above.

Dear Dilma,

Greetings from Indonesia!

As a few people have mentioned in previous posts it sounds like it is less of an issue with Whitebalance and more of an issue with general settings.

With you camera/strobe setup you will without a doubt be able to take some amazing pictures.

Which lenses do you usually use?

For shooting small objects (macro) without the need of having a blue background I would go for these settings:

Whitebalance: Auto

Shutterspeed: 1/250

Aperture: f.16.0

ISO: 100

Flash: TTL

*Please note that you have to enter manual mode to be able to choose these settings.

The settings above should give you consistently good macro shots to start out with, now if you are shooting wide-angle then it is a whole different game!

Let us know how you come along and feel free to post some pictures for us to have a look at!

Sincerely,

Morten Hansen

Dilma,

you should post a picture showing your problem to avoid that we guess about your problem.

Just guessing i add: Are you sure that your strobe is syncronize with the camera?

The strobe may fire but in the wrong moment so the picture will be all blue as it get no illumiation from the strobe.
If the pictures are all blue while using your Sola Video 2100 then there is a problem with the settings of your camera.

I had the D7000 and using 2 INON Z-240 strobes i never had blue pictures, except the strobe did not fire or the motiv was too far away.

As String mentioned: If you are shooting wide angle the YS-D1 ttl system may be fooled by the high ambient light and not giving enough power to illuminate a fish from below shooting upwards.

Chris

I seriously doubt the Sola 2100 is going to help anyway unless its night time or very deep. Its nowhere near powerful enough shallow and sunny to overcome natural light.

If its wide angle you need to be close - if you're over half a metre away its too far. And if you are close enough my money is on TTL not firing the strobe enough so switching to manual is the answer.

If macro then TTL should, kind of work.

Here's an idea I picked up from a diver in Fiji who shot a lot of video. He kept a white card zip-tied onto one of his fins. When he needed to, he pointed his camera at the card and reset the white balance.

I wear white fins when filming, no need to zip tie a card to my fins...

Use manual settings as TTL will cut out prior to proper exposure. You can over ride TTL a bit but your better off using all manual and just getting used to thinking about your f-stop while you approch your shot.

Hi there...

I recently watched the following youtube video which I found very helpful

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6kQJ4RowXA

I hope it helps you also

I think someone may have already suggested it, but if you're using that camera using RAW and adjusting the balance in some thing like lightroom or aperture will remove a lot of your headaches and is a perfectly acceptable method and is a lot cheaper and less frustrating than fiddling around with filters.

Is there any way to white balance using a go pro hero 4 other than using a red filter...thanks...any help will be appreciated...Rich

Is there any way to white balance using a go pro hero 4 other than using a red filter...thanks...any help will be appreciated...Rich

No. GoPro uses highly compressed codecs so there is no hope of correcting in post and has no ability to set custom white balance either. You need to get it right in camera that you can do down to circa 60 feet with a filter