Fixing White Balance - JPG vs RAW

Have you ever taken a picture that was too yellow, too blue or just overall not the way it looked in person? That would be a white balance issue. I've mentioned before how important it is to pay attention to white balance when shooting in JPG vs. RAW.

When I spent the afternoon with one of my friends at the Modern art museum, I snapped a photo of her that was just awful in terms of white balance. So I thought, hey blog post! Here's a little video tip about why it's important to pick the right white balance setting if you're shooting in jpg format. And a little bit about the difference between shooting in JPG vs. RAW.

As you can see the auto white balance is bad in this picture. The light is way too yellow and red. If you shoot this in JPG without paying attention to the white balance, it's tricky and sometimes impossible to fix. If you shoot this in RAW you can easily fix the white balance issue in editing (I use Lightroom.)

Ewwwww. Look at all that green. I mean, it's better but no cigar. Really I'm done trying to fix this (fixing jpg white balance is just not my thing!)

Now here's the same image (the RAW format) after white balance correction in post editing.  It looks SO much better and more true to life, and it was really easy to fix.

So basically there's nothing wrong with shooting in JPG - but this is why it's really important to pay attention and choose the right white balance setting for the situation you're shooting in. Next time you're out taking pictures, try to remember the white balance and keep it in mind. If you do change the white balance, don't forget to change back to AWB when you're done. Unless of course you're totally feeling all Oompa Loompa up in here.