I set a CWB everytime I shoot indoors, I use all sorts of gadgets, grey cards and things such as an expo disc. Is there a meter that will give an accurate Kelvin reading that i can set on my camera? If I am shooting a HS gym, that has halide lights or tungsten etc gets frustrating with cycling lights. Can a light meter do this? and ahs anyone done this regularly. Shooting no flash just ambient? thanks

Besides using a grey card and setting a custom WB, I have learned another handy trick of putting the camera into Live View and then set a custom color temperature by scrolling with the sub-command dial while viewing on the LCD screen.

Chris Noyes wrote:
Besides using a grey card and setting a custom WB, I have learned another handy trick of putting the camera into Live View and then set a custom color temperature by scrolling with the sub-command dial while viewing on the LCD screen.

Good info. Thanks.

yes there are very accurate color temp meters
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/search?atclk=Category_Photography&sts=ma&ci=15293&N=4294205295&Ntt=color+temp+meter&cm_sp=Filters-_-Category-_-Photography

Minolta used to make a colormeter, you could probably find a used one or maybe another manufacturer is making one. They wont help with cycling lights though because the color and intensity of light changes during the cycling.

that would now be the Kenko meter. they bought them out of this line.

amlsml wrote:
I set a CWB everytime I shoot indoors, I use all sorts of gadgets, grey cards and things such as an expo disc. Is there a meter that will give an accurate Kelvin reading that i can set on my camera? If I am shooting a HS gym, that has halide lights or tungsten etc gets frustrating with cycling lights. Can a light meter do this? and ahs anyone done this regularly. Shooting no flash just ambient? thanks


A color meter won't help in your setting. For it to be useful, you'll have to take readings at multiple points in the gym with the crowd already present, since they absorb and reflect some of the light. Same goes for the Expodisc, it'll only read the light in your general vicinity, which might be vastly different from the source. You're probably stuck with the custom white balance and shooting bursts to get some good light between the funky parts of the cycle.

Light temperature only makes sense if the light spectrum is a black body spectrum*. Incandescent lights are a very good approximation to a black body but some arc lamps are very different. In such a case, no color temperature setting will produce the correct colors.

* See wikipedia, or your favorite book on modern physics.

its all relative.