problem doing my white balance

[jfproul]

since this is one of the most important setting you can do to get nice
underwater pics ...i've starded doing my white balance rescently and my
E-510 gives me an error telling me that the camera isn't able to do white balance because of whatever , i don't really remember what the message says but ...

sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't ...seems to me that when its darker the camera is not able to do it ...

anyone of you experience the same problem ? what can do to solve that problem ?


thanks

 

[ce4jesus]

You will probably get that message if you're not pointing at something white. Try carrying a dive slate with you and use that. BTW, if you shoot RAW, you can white balance the photo later in the Olympus Master 2 software although sometimes getting the blues right is difficult when you do this.

 

[kadleck]

You will probably get that message if you're not pointing at something white. Try carrying a dive slate with you and use that. BTW, if you shoot RAW, you can white balance the photo later in the Olympus Master 2 software although sometimes getting the blues right is difficult when you do this.

I agree with both these points. Your camera can shoot RAW, and that is certainly the way to go, when underwater; partly because it is easier to tweak the white balance later, and partly because white balance changes with depth, so without shooting RAW you would need to be almost constantly changing the white balance.

Take one photo per depth change with your slate or something white/grey in shot, then back at the computer (using your Olympus software or Photoshop, etc.) use the 'dropper' to select the white portion. You will then have the colour settings for the remaining shots taken at the same depth. Sounds difficult, but it's far easier than doing it under water and getting your error.

By the way, the white balance error can be caused due to lack of light or too much light! Most cameras have quite a narrow range that will be accepted by the internal WB software.

BTW, shooting RAW generates very large (as in MBytes) images. You will need a bigger card in your camera... But it is definitely the way to go!

 

[jfproul]

i am using a white slate and the only thing that i have to check is is the distance
between the camera and the slate ... my point of shoot does care about distance or
light i just do the white balance and thats it ... the e-510 seems to be picky about
white balance ...

thanks

 

[jfproul]

raw isn't for me ... way toooooo much time playing with that ... if i have to adjust
100 pictures i will commit suicide ...

 

[ce4jesus]

raw isn't for me ... way toooooo much time playing with that ... if i have to adjust
100 pictures i will commit suicide ...

The nice thing about a DLSR is you can do Jpeg + RAW on an 8G card and still get more photos than you can take on a dive. BTW, you can batch process your RAWs which allows for you to hit a key and walk away, then come back later to a folder of Jpegs.