White Balance, Gray Card or Not?

. . What kind of photography have you been doing lately? And what are you hoping to learn? It seems most every photographer I know, including myself, is almost always looking for a way to improve, or learn a new skill to take their photography to a higher level. But sometimes we could go back a level and do something so basic that perhaps we've even forgotten the use of a tool which can really make our efforts at getting great shots much easier. Remember the gray card and white balance (WB)? I'd be willing to bet you rarely use this. Let me know if I'm mistaken.

How simple is setting WB? Very simple. However you will need a gray card. You can pay a little or a lot depending on where you choose to purchase one. The reason WB is so important and worth the time and the price? Well I suppose if you shoot everything in Auto, and set your camera for Auto WB too, then you can get by with some reasonably good shots. But if you shoot in RAW capture as most of us photographers do these days, then after ingesting all of your shoot, you'll want to choose the one photo which has the gray card in it, and if using Photoshop RAW plugin, you simply select the WB icon, an eyedropper, then click on the gray card and you'll have produced a near perfect WB. Now you only have left to select all of the images from the exact same lighting series of shots and synchronize them. What a difference and what a time-saver too.

Here's hoping your Fall shoots were successful with the use of white balance control.