ATC Tower Times Two (and camera tips!)

View of the ATC tower from the Bulls’ Park.

The first, warmer shot is the more natural light, and the bluer one isn’t an effect… I was just trying a setting to correct for the lights on the tower and see how that looked— which is kind a nice too…

This might be a chance for me to get on my photog soapbox.

Learn to use the manual color settings on your camera. The auto ‘white balance’ setting is often pretty awful, so 5 minutes learning online (like HERE) and ten minutes testing it on your camera, can give you a lifetime of better looking photos.

The key camera white balance settings to learn are:

• Sunny day: Try the sun or the cloudy setting to get nice rich, accurate color (auto is often very cool and unpleasant on skinniness)
• Stage Lighting or Indoors without flash: the Tungsten light bulb icon setting will cool down the overly-warm lights
• Flash: You’d think your camera knows you have the flash up and auto would work, but sometimes it’s too smart for itself and picks a color that’s not ideal (it’s a long story why)— so set your camera to the flash lightning bolt setting
• Florescent: is often not too bad with auto white balance, but if your camera has a few choices, give them a try if you are getting too cool or greenish light in a florescent-lit room

OK, class has ended. Go out and try it and let me know if you have questions.

photos by: HuthPhoto

at the American Tobacco Campus, Durham NC