Pictures are all too pink

tuckeredout · Mar 29, 2009

Hello,

I am hoping someone can give me some pointers and we can figure out what I am doing wrong. I have a small "studio" in my basement. It is not perfect, by any means. There is no natural light and it is small. I have 2 softboxes set up. I am using an Oylmpus E410 SLR. No matter what I do for settings, it seems my pictures all come out with a reddish-pink hue. I know it is not the camera, because it takes beautiful pictures pretty much every where else. It is just in my studio that I have the real problems. This is especially true if I am using my white backgrounds. Without me having to go through every single setting on my camera for every background I own, I was hoping someone could shed some light on what is happening to cause this problem. I can reverse the problem somewhat once on my computer by adjusting the color balance with cool tones, but I would rather not have to deal with the issue at all. Any suggestions?

Jaszek · Mar 29, 2009

If you are shooting in RAW it would be easier to correct, JPEG not so much but check your white balance settings.

LuckySo-n-So · Mar 29, 2009

Don't mean to ask a dumb question, but do you have fluorescent overhead lighting in the basement? I ask that because there is a wide variety of colors in fluorescent lighting--including pink, yellow, blue, white, cool white, soft white, etc. It is kind of imperceptable if all two or four tubes are the same color, but put a pink next to a cool white, and it is quite noticeable.

rufus5150 · Mar 29, 2009

JPEG not so much but check your white balance settings

You can actually configure photoshop to open tif and jpegs in RAW. Though you stand more of a chance of losing pixels, you've got a pretty easy window into the white balance controls.

As for the OP, read up in the manual on how to set a custom white balance (I'm not an olympus expert but I'm hoping you can). Get a grey card, shoot that, set the white balance and go.

epp_b · Mar 29, 2009

Sounds like a white balance issue. See you can find a kelvin rating for the lightbulbs your using and set your white balance accordingly. If not, then fluorescent or incandescent (tungsten) white balance is a pretty safe bet according to the bulbs you use. If you shoot in RAW, you can set the white balance in PP without having to adjust the curves.

The technique to get a bright white background is to expose it beyond the 255 digital ceiling (blow it out). Spot metering for the subject will generally do the job for this.

manaheim · Mar 29, 2009

rufus5150 said:
You can actually configure photoshop to open tif and jpegs in RAW. Though you stand more of a chance of losing pixels, you've got a pretty easy window into the white balance controls.

I must be misunderstanding you... open up a TIF or JPEG in RAW? The RAW format is the format of a full sensor dump. JPEGs are a compressed translation of that sensor dump... even if you could actually do this, you wouldn't have all the info you would have if you took it in RAW. Again, maybe I'm misunderstanding.

Anyway, your problem smacks of a color balance issue... which others have said or hinted at. Either tune your white balance to meet the settings, use flash to overpower the ambient colors (flashes have a "correct" color balance), or use RAW to take the pictures and adjust the color in post processing.

Especially indoors, I would probably opt to do the latter two together.

rufus5150 · Mar 29, 2009

Sorry, I meant Adobe Camera Raw. You can configure photoshop to open TIF and JPEGs in ACR (giving you access to the WB controls). In Photoshop CS3 this is:

edit->preferences->File Handling->Prefer Adobe Camera Raw for JPEG Files

in bridge there's a similar setting for TIF and JPEG under the preferences for Thumbnail.

EhJsNe · Mar 29, 2009

check your white balance. and make sure all you lighting is the same type. (for example using a tungsten and a flourescent will result in screwed up pictures that are hard to fix...especially if shooting in JPG)

As stated by almost everyperson, using photoshop is a good way to fix this, but your best option would be to fix the problem by setting the white balance on the camera, that way you have minimal editing.

manaheim · Mar 29, 2009

rufus5150 said:
Sorry, I meant Adobe Camera Raw. You can configure photoshop to open TIF and JPEGs in ACR (giving you access to the WB controls). In Photoshop CS3 this is:

edit->preferences->File Handling->Prefer Adobe Camera Raw for JPEG Files

in bridge there's a similar setting for TIF and JPEG under the preferences for Thumbnail.

That's interesting, though you'll still have the same issue where the data isn't present (far more of an issue with JPEG than TIFF... though, I think for most cameras the default for the TIFF is a lossless compression or no compression)

rufus5150 · Mar 29, 2009

manaheim said:
That's interesting, though you'll still have the same issue where the data isn't present (far more of an issue with JPEG than TIFF... though, I think for most cameras the default for the TIFF is a lossless compression or no compression)

It's just like importing/editing jpegs and tifs with Lightroom because, let's face it, lightroom is bridge and camera raw scrunched together with a prettier interface and a few organizational and publishing tools. It doesn't have as much to work with but it gives you 2 important controls -- the pair of white balance controls and the vibrance slider.

craig · Mar 30, 2009

Post some details such as WB setting, and lighting used. Posting an example image would be really good as well. Shooting RAW is never a bad idea, but it is better to let the camera do the work.

Love & Bass

Dwig · Mar 31, 2009

Two questions:

1: what type of lights are in the softboxes?

2: what material are you using for your white backdrops.

One possible reason for the pinkish/magenta cast the the pictrues is UV phophorescence. This occurs when the lights emit large amounts of UV illumination (fluorescent, inexpensive electronic flash, ...) and the white material is common paper for white fabric rather than special photographic meterials.

If this is the cause for off color results you will never be successful in correcting it by using any form of reasonable post processing adjustment (White Balance, ...). You need to use lamps that are filtered for UV and fabrics that do not contain "optical brightners".

Dao · Mar 31, 2009

Is your studio in a finished basement? If not, or not a fully finished basement, will it be some light were bounced from the basement wood color ceiling or walls? You camera set the white balance to flash, but the light bounced from wood will be warmer.

Garbz · Mar 31, 2009

Ignore where the problem comes from and use the camera to fix it. Custom white balance off a grey card or the white background will fix green/purple casts too.

jcolman · Apr 1, 2009

Dwig said:
Two questions:

1: what type of lights are in the softboxes?

2: what material are you using for your white backdrops.

One possible reason for the pinkish/magenta cast the the pictrues is UV phophorescence. This occurs when the lights emit large amounts of UV illumination (fluorescent, inexpensive electronic flash, ...) and the white material is common paper for white fabric rather than special photographic meterials.

If this is the cause for off color results you will never be successful in correcting it by using any form of reasonable post processing adjustment (White Balance, ...). You need to use lamps that are filtered for UV and fabrics that do not contain "optical brightners".

Pardon me for being a bit rude but this is pure rubbish. You can easily obtain perfect results from any backdrop and not just "special photographic materials".