Does your client also prefer cool color temperature ?
Color temperature and lighting is a technical science all by it self. On a big photo shoot many professional photographers actually hire a lighting specialist to assure that all lighting is the same color temperature. That means the lighting technician must change out all light fixtures to have the same lighting type, before the shoot. They make them all incandescent OR all halogen, flourescent etc. Then the specifications and light recommendations are given to the photographer so they can adapt the camera settings.
What can we do as small companies? We can observe our ambient lighting conditions and make the required White Balance changes to our camera.
MIXed lighting is the most difficult [but not impossible] to determine before we actually begin photography work. The Gray (or white, gray, black) card is placed in the lens view - it reflects ambient light back through the camera lens and is recorded on the cameras CCD or CMOS recording chip.
For example, we can use an 18% gray card. A digital camera typically uses 16% to 18% gray as a baseline for determining the remaining colors. Using an 18% gray card in your actual images will help Photoshop determine what the color Gray is.. and will automatically adjust the balance of the color spectrum.
Below find an example of an A4 (8x10") 18% gray card. I made Gray rgb (209,209,209). I place the card in the camera lens view, take the shots and after post processing I clone out the card. White Balancing adjustments can be made in the camera or in photoshop.
If you use Photoshop "Levels" you will find 3 eye droppers. 1 is for sampling the image's 'What is White'. 2nd is to tell photoshop 'what is black' and the last is 'What is Gray'.
So using the gray card, you are telling the camera (and photoshop) THIS IS GRAY.
As an alternative in mixed lighting conditions, you can place an A4 (8x10") piece of white printer paper on the floor, then in the camera menu... select something called White Balance "LEARN" mode for the first shot. The ambient mixed light is reflecting off the White paper back to your cameras CCD and the camera now learns that THIS light is WHITE and the camera will self adjust the white balance.
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Dave
Forum Moderator for
EasyPano - Panoweaver
Pano2VR
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