I produced my first contact sheet from a set a homework – produce three photoshoots of environmental portraiture; here’s my first! I took it of my step-dad with his bicycle as he’s really big into bikes, races, the history! I thought it’d be a perfect opportunity for my first shoot.
The color cast is affected by the temperature of color with different light sources. In my recording of these portrait photographs, I experimented with countering these color casts through a variety of different white balances. By doing this, whites that are rendered by unrealistic color casts are balanced and look better under different light conditions.
Before carrying out my environmental photoshoots, I did some research on a photographer who specialises in this specific area to give me an idea of what I wish to produce and how to do it best and whir environmental photography is all about. I came across Anthony Kurtz who has given me many ideas and bettered my understanding of how to capture photographs of people in their natural surroundings.
White Balance is the balance between turning unrealistic colors which are affected by the color temperature into realistic ones. The warmth and coldness of the light affecting the white may appear inaccurate to what the photographer wants through green and orange. By balancing the white, the white stays as a white that works in correspondence with the colors of the photograph.
The Kalvin temperature scale:
| Color Temperature | Light Source |
| 1000-2000 K | Candlelight |
| 2500-3500 K | Tungsten Bulb (household variety) |
| 3000-4000 K | Sunrise/Sunset (clear sky) |
| 4000-5000 K | Fluorescent Lamps |
| 5000-5500 K | Electronic Flash |
| 5000-6500 K | Daylight with Clear Sky (sun overhead) |
| 6500-8000 K | Moderately Overcast Sky |
| 9000-10000 K | Shade or Heavily Overcast Sky |
My First shoot is at the CCA Art Gallery, because my friend, called Victoria loves art and is an extremely good artist. I didn’t have much time in the art gallery so I used the few images that I took and edited them a few times to get more photos. I took photos like this because I wanted to create an artistic image so go with the character of the subject and the environment.
The Kelvin Scale is a more intricate way to edit the white balance on your camera. It is simply a unit of measurement for temperature and in photography we most often use it to measure the color temperature of light sources. The temperature scale most often used in photography ranges from about 2000K (K=Kelvin) to 9000K.
White balance allows you to edit the lighting of your image as you are in the field doing a photo shoot. You can use the white balance settings on your camera to make the colours in your image more balanced or simply for bringing out colours in the image. For example, if you are in a shaded location you can change the white balance to the shady option. In this experimental shoot i took photos using all the white balance tones from direct sunlight to incandescent. My contact sheets show how these settings can change the tone of the image.
