white balance

White balance

Most consumer-level camcorders have an "auto-white balance" feature, and this is how most amateurs operate. The camera performs it's own white balance without any input from the operator. In fact, very few home-video users are aware of it's existence. Unfortunately, the auto-white balance is not particularly reliable and it is usually preferable to perform this function manually.

"Auto-white" means the completely automatic function (no user input at all).
"Manual-white" means the operation described below.
"Colour correction" means any other method of adjusting colours.

You should perform this procedure at the beginning of every shoot, and every time the lighting conditions change. It is especially important to re-white balance when moving between indoors and outdoors, and between rooms lit by different kinds of lights. During early morning and late evening, the daylight colour changes quickly and significantly (although your eyes don't notice, your camera will). Do regular white balances during these periods.

If you use blue colours it turns warm white balance and if you use yellow colours it turns cool white balance.