manual white balance for Sony F-717

Hi there,

I am using a Sony F-717 in an Amphibico housing for a while now and am quite pleased with (some of) the pictures. However, I found it very difficult to set the manual white balance at greater depths (below 5m, actually <sigh>). I tried to point to the white sand or grey rock (as grey card replacement), but the camera would just not set the white balance. No problems at the surface or at very shallow depths. I reverted back to using the default settings, but the tonal balance is often less than optimal.

Does anybody know a procedure to "trick" the camera in setting WB at greater depths? Is it just because of the lack of ambient light or rather the dominance of blue and green hues that prevent the camera from setting WB?

Or is it just one of those limitations I have to live with until I can afford to upgrade to fullframe DSLR ?

Thanks for you help,

Eric

The back of my dive slate does pretty well for me (sand tends to have too much variation).

Although, I'm thinking of painting my fins white so I don't have to juggle the slate and camera.

Dan

Hey Dan,

thanks for the tip - I tried it out during the weekend - but it had the same results as before. The camera just wouldnt set the WB under less than optimal (shallow) conditions. I tried to set WB with some white/gray slates from the distance to really close-up.

Guess I have live with it - oh well :roll:

BTW - painting the fins whits is certainly a neat idea - not sure though how the color would hold on the fins over time.....

Dan,

I have been trying one technique I have heard of in the net, but just on land. I use a Pringles cap on the lens to manually set WB, and it works!! I still have to try that underwater, but a Pringles can is cheap, so you could try it before I will be able.

Bye!

I personally do not like the look of manually white balanced underwater photos. They look fake, like there is no water. Since you are always shooting with a strobe, setting daylight, or flash balance seems to work for me, so the strobe lit subject looks right, and the background is bluish...

Getting any DSLR will not help this problem, as it is a real world light balance limitation.

Getting a P&S with raw mode is nice though, so you can ajust the white balance after the fact, if needed.

The new sony V3 looks VERY good for UW - blazing fast autofocus, shutter lag, and raw mode...

Don