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Review by Drew Strickland, Professional Photography Reviewer and Inventor of the ColorRight Digital White Balance
As all photo pros know, white balance is one of the most important aspects of photography. If you’ve shot digital for any significant amount of time, you’ve discovered how difficult it can be to obtain accurate white balance.
This challenge is not going away anytime soon. As long as the auto white balance functions of today’s cameras continue to fall short, we will be dealing with off-color images. Before we look further at this new patent pending solution, let’s review some of the current digital white balance methods.
The “Save it for Post Production” Methods
The methods outlined in this section basically try to save the white balance work for post-production. The first approach we will review (Gray Card ) functions by inserting some sort of white balance reference into the image frame each time the lighting changes. The second approach (Raw Approach) tries to get by with the auto white balance setting of the camera and then guesses at the right white balance during post production. Both of these approaches have a few pluses, but they have even more minuses.
The Gray Card Approach:
In a studio, or formal portrait sitting a gray card type solution may work great. But just imagine being at a wedding, or covering a football game and asking the subject of your image to stop what they are doing to hold a gray card type of product for you.
What about the guy or gal doing barrel runs at an equestrian event? Or the race car driver, or the musician on stage? What about Landscape Photography?
“Excuse me, Mr.Grand Canyon Mountain, could you please hold this white balance target while I run 4 or 5 miles back to my tripod mounted camera to get a great picture of these amazing colors splashing across your face in the sunset?”
The absurdity of all these solutions really starts to dawn on you, if you stop to think about the sub-par “solutions” we have put up with in regards to white balance.
As you well know, the action is not going to wait on you. Nor, should it. Most photographers would rather have their clients view their presence at these events as an asset, not an obnoxious intrusion.
Even though you don’t have to spend as much time in post as the next method, you still have to go through all of your files and “copy-paste” your settings from your reference frame to all the other images with similar lighting.
The Raw "Band-Aid" Approach:
One of the main reasons our company originally adopted a raw workflow was in an effort to tame this ugly multi-colored challenge. While going all raw worked to some degree, it is an onerous and sub-optimal solution to this problem. Don’t get me wrong, we still shoot raw quite regularly, and there are many other reasons why you may want to shoot in raw, but white balance really shouldn’t be among them.
Why? Because it is very time consuming to try and adjust the white balance manually in post. It is also, by its very nature, inaccurate. When attempting to do this in post without a reference target you are just guessing as to what the true colors were. This is what I like to call the "Raw Band-Aid."
Raw Band-Aid Shoot color blind all day and hope you have the time, energy and memory to bandage it all up in post production. Until fairly recently, no other viable option existed for those who often shoot extensively at live events.
Custom White Balance Method:
Using the Custom White Balance method is a better solution than the previously described approaches. This solution accurately measures the white balance when you capture the image. It works without completely stopping the action, or involving your subjects in the process. This approach uses the built-in camera custom white balance function. Using this approach also means that you will rarely, if ever, need to edit white balance in post. If your primary reason for shooting raw is white balance (color) issues, you can now save lots of time and hard drive space by capturing straight to jpeg.
While it is possible to use a gray card type product for custom white balance, as well, we have discussed how impractical this is when shooting live events.
A few years ago a different set of tools that use the custom white balance approach arrived on the scene. These white balance caps (diffusers) meet some of our criteria, but typically still have five main challenges for our white balance needs. These challenges are that they accept light from 180 degrees, very few are truly neutral, some of them cost a bundle to outfit your whole kit, most do not work well with flash, many do not work well in low light (especially with Nikon).
Challenge #1: These Caps are Not Very Targeted
These caps act as an “integrator of broad light acceptance angle:”
What does that mean? One of the main challenges with most existing white balance diffusers, is that they treat all light entering the lens the same. In other words, light at the edge of the frame is given a similar weight to light at the center of the frame. Not only that, by using small pits in the surface, some products specifically attempt to mix all of the different light sources together so the camera will give an average reading for all of the light sources within 180 degrees. A gray card will give a more targeted reading but has already been ruled out due to the fast, hectic nature of live events.
I don’t want the camera to essentially weigh all light coming from 180 degrees the same. I’m not interested in that blinding light right behind the subject’s head, or the one coming from the videographer’s hot light on the side of the dance floor. I’m only interested in the light source illuminating the face of my subject. The COLORRIGHT allows for more isolation of the subject in regards to white balance.
Challenge #2: Not Chromatically or Spectrally Neutral
What does that mean anyway? In a nutshell, it means that most white balance diffuser type products are not chromatically or spectrally neutral. You will often wind up with images that are a bit too warm, or too cool depending on the product. There is also very little quality control with less expensive diffusers. There is also an internet invented fallacy floating around that suggests you can use household items like plastic lids to get a good white balance reading. Needless to say, these are usually far from being neutral as there is no quality control for use as a white balance tool.
Challenge #3: High Cost Most caps are made to attach directly to the camera lens. It becomes quite costly to purchase a separate cap for each size of lens in your bag. This multiplies the inconvenience, as you now have to keep up with a different cap for each lens used on the job. Of course, you can just buy a large 82mm size cap and hold it over the lens. However, the cost of this one product is over $100 for something constructed primarily of plastic composites. Challenge #4: Do Not Work Well With Flash
Some diffusers do not work well with flash because they were made to also provide exposure information. These caps only allow 18% of the light to pass through to the sensor. When a flash is attached this becomes a real liability, as it is necessary to manually overexpose by about 3 stops to get an accurate reading. Challenge #5: Do Not Work Well in Low Light The same issue here. The most popular diffuser solution only allows 18% of the light to pass through. This creates a situation where low light readings can be cumbersome and more time consuming. The Ultimate White Balance Tool
We have studied our criteria for a white balance solution extensively. We have reviewed the existing solutions. We found none of the products delivered suitable performance for many photographers. Taking this information, we dedicated ourselves to creating the Ultimate Custom White Balance Tool. The COLORRIGHT is the patent pending result of all the hard work.
Easy to Use
Convenient
Center-Weighted
Accurate (Chromatically and Spectrally Very Neutral)
Well Constructed
Cost efficient
Works Better in Low Light Works Better with Flash
Guaranteed to work with all Digital SLRs and Lenses, including those by Canon, Nikon, Fuji, Pentax, Olympus, Sony and many more.
Easy to Use:
Simply set your camera in custom white balance mode instead of auto white balance. Then take a single reference image each time you change location or lighting.
Total time: 15 seconds or less. Step by step instructions are included for every major camera model. Convenient:
One Size Fits All - The COLORRIGHT does not attach to the lens, so one 82mm filter size will work with all lenses 82mm filter size or smaller. You do not need to fish around in your bags for a different size for each lens.
Accurate:
The COLORRIGHT has multiple carefully selected spectrally neutral layers. Some of these layers block light, while others help ensure a center-weighted measurement. Each layer has been carefully selected to ensure accurate white balance.
The COLORRIGHT has been tested and verified to be one of the very few chromatically and spectrally neutral white balance diffusers on the market. Independent technical writer Doug Kerr has said of an earlier version of the COLORRIGHT called the color parrot that it is:
"a well-constructed, effective white balance
measurement diffuser. It exhibits good chromatic neutrality (the most
important attribute of such a tool)."
As you can see below, the built in auto white balance setting produces colors that are way off the mark. The COLORRIGHT performs much better.
COLORRIGHT Center Weighted for "Real Life" shooting:
The White Target is center-weighted to provide a more targeted reading.
Especially useful in "real life" mixed lighting environments with a backlit subject.
COLORRIGHT Center-Weighted Advantage
You can easily see how The COLORRIGHT's Center Weighted white balance measure is giving more weight to the face. The skin tones are much more accurate. The other non-targeted diffuser is too blue. This is because this scene was backlit by a different color light.
*"Real Life" Reflective Measurements are used in all of these samples because that is the way almost all live event photographers need to work. They need to be able to simply point the COLORRIGHT at the subject(s) they are photographing.
It is also possible to use the COLORRIGHT in another more time consuming manner, by standing where your subject is and photographing the actual lights hitting the subject. While this "incident" method will sometimes produce more accurate results than the reflective method, it is often impractical/ impossible to use this longer method. You may wish to use this method when in a more controlled lighting environment (eg. studio work). Most other manufacturers of white balance diffusers state that the incident method is the only correct way to use their product. The COLORRIGHT has been designed for use with both methods of measurement. Works Better with Flash:
Well Constructed:
The COLORRIGHT is constructed of high quality glass and metal, not composite or plastic. It is not easily scratched, as some of the other products are.
Cost Efficient:
Since there is only one product to buy, you will most likely spend much less for a complete white balance solution. Some other companies charge over $100 for the same size product.
Take Action and Take Back Control of your Color
With The Color Right it only takes about 15 seconds to get accurate white balance as you go through the day. Why not save yourself lots of time in post with COLORRIGHT.
Purchase COLORRIGHT 
"This sucker works!! Colorright gives me truer colors and saves lots of time back at the office...and TIME is MONEY!" David Beckstead American Photo Magazine Top 10 Wedding Photographer of 2007 see what other pros are saying... *Guarantee: if it does not work with your camera we will fully refund your payment price minus any applicable sales tax and shipping. Product is fully backed by a 2 year manufacturing defect warranty. Works with all standard lenses.
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