A while back I invested in something called an Expodisc. I had heard great things about it and it was relatively inexpensive (as far as photography investments go). I tried to get use to it, got a little overwhelmed and confused, and ultimately, gave up. Didn't your mom (or someone who knew what they were talking about) ever tell you to NEVER give up? Well, recently while on Chic Critique Forum, (this is my Glimpses 52 image for the week) someone was talking about their Expodisc. It put a little bur under my saddle so I'm trying to get the hang of it again. Potentially, it could save me tons of time! IF (fat "if") I get use to it and use it all the time my white balance would always be spot on and I wouldn't have to change it in Photoshop.
So, here's my experimenting tonight:
This picture is just having my white balance on Auto (AWB). If you look at the things that are suppose to be white, it's clear to see that the color is completely off. (For example, the word "Shield" is white in real life.)
Side note: We are NOT giving Carter the drug "meth". He takes a medication called Methotrexate... but occasionally, joking around, we say he's a meth head. :)
At that point I tried to use the Expodisc. I had the exposure correct for the meds (or whatever the subject may be), held the Expodisc up against the lens of my camera, and took a picture. It was mostly black. I went into my camera settings, changed the white balance to "Custom" and set the custom white balance on that picture that I had just taken that was mostly black. Then I snapped another picture of the meds. This is what I got.
Ummm... a swing and a miss. Wow. I would say this picture's just a LITTLE green. :) Next attempt was to put the Expodisc back on and take another picture (leaving the exposure the same) of the light source. In this case, that was the Tungsten pendent lights above the meds. This is what my picture WITH the Expodisc looked like.
This is SUPER green. I'm sure it's because I had just totally screwed up my custom white balance a second before. I then set this picture above as my new Custom White Balance setting, and tried once again to take a picture of the meds. This is what I got.
It's perfect! This image is straight off the camera. Nothing has been done to it. I feel like I can handle the Expodisc indoors... now to conquer handling it in back lit shade lighting... :)
Next, about the pictures. Carter is on tons of meds. (Duh.) Monday nights are his big night. He has 2-3 different kinds of medications depending on the Monday night we are dealing with. He has at least 8 pills (upwards of 10 on occasion). If he's awake he takes them fine. If he's sleeping? Well, that's a different story. He is SOOOOOOOO (SO!) hard to wake up. It takes us several minutes to wake him up. Often times it involves removing any and all covers, turning on his light, using loud voices, splashing him with water, sitting him up... you name it, we've tried it. Once we have him sitting we reach for the meds and turn around to find him snuggled up again on his pillow. So, next time we hold his arm while reaching for the meds and water. He will take a sip of water and lay back down, assuming he has taken his pills. We finally recorded it (because he absolutely does NOT believe us in the morning when we tell him how silly he was being) so he could see himself. He laughed the entire way through it.
He's seriously such a trooper... especially after weeks like this past one. It was one of the hardest we have had and it's not letting up a whole lot. He's finally making it through an entire day of school today (an hour and a half to go!). Something he hasn't done for over a week. Poor guy. Two years and one month to go... but who's counting.