you're filming on set but something is off composition looks good but the color is all weird
maybe it's the screen or your camera though it's likely gonna be your white balance
understanding what color temperature is is incredibly important to your cinematography
your eyes automatically adjust whereas your camera has to manually be told the white balance of any
given scene while you can fix this in post and we will be going over a few things later in hitfilm
it's best to get your white balance as close to accurate in camera as possible especially if your
camera doesn't support raw or log formatting understanding white balance will save you a
lot of time in the long run and also ensures that your footage has the correct visual data
for you to edit in post i'm tom from FXhome by Artlist and let's jump into today's video
we measure color temperature in kelvin or k usually in figures between 1500 to
10 000 kelvin and if you're new to filmmaking and white balance here's a quick rundown of
that rain starting off around 1900 to 2000 kelvin is candlelight and flames giving off a very warm
orange light 27 to 3300 kelvin is the usual range for interior indoor lighting
fluorescent lights give off a temperature that is seen as natural white daylight can be between
5000 to 6000 kelvin but is usually sitting at 5600 kelvin cloudy overcast days are around 6500 kelvin
anything over 8 000 kelvin is seen as cold and blue and can often be associated with
moonlight the easiest thing to remember is that the lower the value the warmer the color higher
the value the bluer the color white balancing is simply telling the camera what to see as white
once you've chosen a value for your white balance anything above that range will be colder and
anything below will be warmer this is why you need to set your white balance to the right tone
otherwise it can look very weird yes the perfect white balance hi i'm editing this video right now
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notification bell we do these videos weekly so you don't want to miss out on the next exciting topic
back to learning about white balance now let's talk solutions the first step of solving any
white balance issue is to understand the correct environment and the color temperatures done though
unless you work in an environment where you can control the color temperature of your lights
you're going to need to familiarize yourself with a couple of standard scenarios that you'll find
yourself in most cameras come with presets for the usual cases that can work nicely as a baseline
there is no shame at all in using the auto white balance especially if you are a beginner your
camera is probably really good at picking up the ambient lighting that is dancing around the room
and able to make its own adjustments they have been known to change and make these adjustments
without prompting potentially ruining a shot if you're a more seasoned camera operator consider
switching to custom white balance and setting your own on set you'll also want to set the white
balance yourself in tricky lighting environments that can confuse the camera's judgement
all you need is a simple white piece of paper or card hold it in front of the camera dead in the
center of the sensor and either take a photo or set it to the new white balance you'll want to do
this every time you start a new scene or the light has shifted remember that your eye automatically
adjusts so it's really good to get a friend or crew member or just set a reminder to give
yourself a prompt to update the white balance you will thank them in the long run and last but not
least we can fix it in post no matter what editor you're using there will be some form of white
balance tool in the color correction features but hitfilm is free for you to use and also comes with
an actual white balance tool so let's figure this out in hitfilm all i'm going to do is go over to
the effects panel and type in white balance you'll see that i already have this saved as a favorite
i'll apply this onto my footage it's already set to white but not my white i'll disable this layer
for the time being as it is already adjusting my footage i'll head on up to the eyedropper picker
choose my white in this case i could even use my t-shirt if i wanted to switch back on the white
balance effect and by looking at the scopes you can see that it's changed our values from here
we have a nice foundation for our color grading from production to post-production white balance
is paramount to any filmmaker if you don't know how to fine tune your white balance start off with
the auto and learn the basics with the presets these days raw files provide a lot of leeway and
ability to adapt and amend after you've shot never give yourself a hard time if the white balance is
shifted but understanding white balance is going to drastically improve your cinematography and
understanding of light i really hope that you've enjoyed this video and if you found
it helpful please do give us a like subscribe if you're not already and ring the notification
bell so you don't miss a video we do these every week so we'll see you in the next video