When having an indoor photoshoot, I notice that the skin tones in the photos I take are always off. The overall color of the photograph is affected too, but the skin color is what really makes it noticable.

I assume that it has to do with lighting. When getting ready to do a quick little photoshoot with my kids I open curtains and blinds to allow plenty of natural light. But, is there a way to improve on this with my camera's settings?

I have been manually editing my photos in photoshop using a color balance adjustment layer (example below). Works fine, but kind of wanting to learn on how to correct the problem rather than cover my boo-boos.

Ali

__________________

"What can be more southern than to obsess about being southern?"
--Elizabeth Fortson Arroyo

Manually setting the white balance on the camera will help with a large chunk of that.
Beautiful pictures of that beautiful new baby too! Congrats!!!

__________________
Colleen in Friendly Manitoba...
Proudly selling digital designs at SBB
(Come take a peek at my Gallery or check my BLOG to see what I'm up to)

Thanks!!!! Luckily, she has been easy on me with letting me practice with my new camera hahaha. I'll read up on setting the white balance and try it out.

Thanks again,
Ali

__________________

"What can be more southern than to obsess about being southern?"
--Elizabeth Fortson Arroyo

Aww...I know nothing but she is the sweetest! Congrats on the new little one!!

__________________

(sig by Scarletheels)

My SBB Store
SBB Blog News

she is just adorable Ali, congrats!!

__________________
Dani B.

My Gallery!
My little Blog

Indoor lighting is very tricky and you will typically get results that are frustratingly different than expected. On board flash is notorious for producing either washed out colors or harsh shadows. Natural lighting is a great equalizer here - using the light spilling in from a window directly on the subject is a great way to photograph.

However, having some add'l off camera lighting is really the best way to go.. and it doesn't have to be expensive. Take a look at the strobist.com website.. they have some amazing info for using small off camera lighting to increase your satisfaction for minimal cost.

Indoor lighting can be difficult however there are ways to work around less-then-perfect lighting conditions.

1. Are you shooting RAW? If so you have the ability to correct for alot of sins at capture in the PS RAW editor.

2. Are you calibrating your monitor? If not you colors may be closer then you think and you may be over-compensating an already good image.

3. What type of White Balancing are you doing? Auto or preset? 90% of the color problems out there are a result of poor white points in both the camera and monitor.

To be honest, I don't know much about my new camera. I am new to the world of SLR. I have read the manual and a book on the topic, but I haven't really learned anything new other than terms. I understand the terms and what they mean, but haven't really learned how to put them to use. Probably won't sink in until I actually practice more.

So, basically I am shooting auto and not learning anything. I tried following the camera's manual to use the other settings, but my photos were blurry. Guessing I just need to practice so I can learn more, and stop using my camera the same as a point and shoot (defeats my purpose of buying a digital SLR in the first place!)

Ali

__________________

"What can be more southern than to obsess about being southern?"
--Elizabeth Fortson Arroyo