Those into digital photography will be familiar with white balance. Setting white balance correctly is important and will save you a lot of time adjusting color using a computer. Here I will explain what white balance is and how to set your camera up.

White balance is a process to set the camera to render the color white correctly. Factors that could throw an image out of white balance are artificial lighting and color temperature. For example, tungsten lighting and setting sunlight will render a warm (yellow/orange) cast, similarly with setting sunlight. Fluorescent lighting, dawn and dusk will render a cool (blue/green) cast.

A typical digital camera has the following white balance settings: AWB (Auto White Balance), Custom White Balance, and in increasing color temperature, Tungsten, Fluorescent, Daylight, Flash, Cloudy, Shade. In general photography with mixed colors in daylight and mixed lighting, AWB will work correctly. However if a particular scene has predominantly warm colors, then the camera will render a cool cast, and vice versa.

Custom White Balance will allow users to take a reflected reading off a white object, usually a piece of white paper, under the same light illuminating the subject.

Incident measurement of the light source can be made using a dedicated light meter or in-camera using "ExpoDisc".

Alternatively, for DIY buffs, you may use a piece of translucent corrugated plastic board which can be placed in front of the lens and aimed at the light source for an incident light reading. Take a shot in AWB. Then use the image as reference for custom white balance. Minor color corrections may be done using white balance correction. This method has been tested on Canon EOS 400D digital single lens reflex (dSLR) camera. It does not work well on Canon PowerShot A460 digital point and shoot camera. Testing on other dSLR makes is in progress.