CHoosing filters, how?

[markbarendt]

I'm getting better a picking color compensating filters but "I ain't perfect".

Is there an old school analog rule of thumb or way to "see" which filters to use without a color meter?

 

[CBG]

Some of the old Kodak Photoguides had a page with a wheel nomograph for filters with some indication of what sort of lighting conditions would require what filtration, but those were for gross adjustment with the 80, 81, 82, 85 series filters to effect major correction for mismatch of light source to film balance - like daylight film and tungsten lighting etc, not for subtle corrections. I suspect that you'll need a color meter to do fine adjustments.

C

 

[Ian Grant]

There's various schools of thought. Some of us only use colour correction filters to match film types to light source, ie to correct a daylight film for tunsten light & vice versa, Others like to correct every exposure.

There's no right or wrong way, for instance you may want to shoot an image in evening light and correct so it looks like normal daylight, and colour matches images made earlier. There's a risk of filtering out the tue magic in the light

In over 30 years shooting commercial work I've rarely corrected, those rare occasions are when shooting interiors with fluorescent lights and I prefer to shoot tests to determine the correct filtration.

Ian

 

[Christopher Walrath]

You have three primary colors: Red, Green and Blue. There are three supplemntary colors in between the primary colors. red, YELLOW, green, CYAN, blue, MAGENTA, red. THink of them on the edge of a wheel. Now filters will allow light of similar wavelength to pass through while blocking all others in increasing degree the further around the wheel the color gets from the color of the filter. So a Red filter will raise the values of reds in your subject in relation to the other colored pigments from which light reflects. Since it allows reds to pass through, your blues, green and cyans will drop off darker in relation to other colors. Go to my website in my sig and hit the 'Better Photography' tutorial and then choose the chapter on color and light. Lays it all out. Hope this helped.

Chris