Which looks more like noon sunlight to you?

I have on hand two CPF favorites, the likes of which won't be revealed until later. Camera's white-balance and exposure was set to automatic for first shots(extremely close to what I saw in person-- yes, the sun is so intense it washes out the leaves a little bit), and static sunlight w/b and exposure the second shots. These were taken at noon on a cloud-free days. Both lights are within 20 lumens of each other in output, although A does have a slightly larger hotspot.

Subject A:



Subject B:

Interesting. Perhaps you will do the same on a uniformly cloudy day as well.


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Slightly overcast is a possibility, as is a later hour, closer to 5. I'm not exactly sure what most flashololics strive for when trying to recreate 'daylight.' That could probably be an interesting poll itself!

I prefer A, but B certainly isn't bad.

I'll play.

Lumens don't look the same...or brightness...or whatever. The two sources are not equal, it would appear.

And why not shoot the same photo? Hard to even compare because in AUTO mode, the camera would adjust for each one. Moving the shot to change the % of sunlight in the picture changed something in the exposure which makes these photos hard to compare.

At exactly what latitude you live can have an effect on what tint compliment the noon sun will have for you as well.

The first light (A) looks greenish to me, but closer to the right tint. B is a hair too warm.

I know nothing about flashlights. I do have a nice monitor.

obi

These are both within 20 lumens of each other, however subject A does have a slightly bigger hotspot.

The camera's auto white balancing and exposure is really good. Adjusting the white balance to daylight would render both warmer than they actually are. As I previously said, this is very accurate to what I see in person.

The shot isn't in the exact same position, but that doesn't affect the color rendering here. The biggest thing it does do however, is not allow subject B to illuminate a few blades of grass like subject A.

But it changes the exposure timing, which affects what percentage of the light in the light's beam is reflected flashlight and how much is reflected sunlight.

And it also does nothing to change tint of the flashlights. I'll shoot again tomorrow at noon to make them perfectly aligned, but it won't change the differences in the lights or most likely people's opinions of them.

Neither look close at all to the sunlit areas. I also agree with others that letting the camera auto-choose the white balance in 2 separate photos can be very misleading.

Brightness isn't the same. The area lit by the flashlights isn't the same. Etc. Not really a fair poll.

I'm also waiting for both lights to be in the same exposure before I'll vote.

twistedraven said:

I have on hand two CPF favorites, the likes of which won't be revealed until later. Camera's white-balance and exposure was set to automatic (extremely close to what I saw in person-- yes, the sun is so intense it washes out the leaves a little bit), this was taken at noon on a cloud-free day. Both lights are within 20 lumens of each other in output, although A does have a slightly larger hotspot.

Click to expand...

Wait... You have to use a set white balance for a test like this. Preferably also set a custom white balance from your base light source (outside sun) using a grey card in that light. While on most nice very modern DSLRs the auto white balance will be very close you have to understand that your flashlights in this instance are in fact affecting the white balance outcome.

If anything set both exposures to one of the basic presets like the "sun setting" which is something like 5000-5300k. Maybe just do an even 5k. Also if you can get a tripod and make sure the exposures are exactly the same including focus and composition. Once you get it set up you can literally do two back to back exposures to get exactly what you want.

------------>>>> THAT BEING SAID.... I definitely prefer B and it looks somewhat warmer and probably closer to direct sunlight. It appears from your pics the A light has cooler tones and cyans that would resemble outdoor shade tones more. True sunlight has a far greater spectrum than any led light will ever achieve, but humans tend to associate a bright sunny day as slightly warmer in color temperature. That psychological effect can be affected by many things though including temperature, time of year, and many other things.

Using my camera's daylight white balance will definitely be a no go, as it renders everything warmer than reality. Auto white balance here is quite good and basically what I saw in person, but I will try to gray card it up come tomorrow.

Making it so the lights illuminate the same area might not be possible, as one has a slightly larger hotspot, and compensating by moving it away might make it lose too much brightness. Tomorrow's pics will definitely be the same exact spot though, for those who need peace of mind.

Okay here... I isolated a same size 10x10 pixel (or so can't remember precise) square sample from the same spot in each image (relative... it was the same leaf in the actual sunlight). I had to increase the overall exposure of sample A by .4 stops in Photoshop. This shows the exposures were either not taken right at the same time, the shutter speed/iso/aperture was slightly different, or the sun/clouds shifted slightly. There is a tinge more saturation to sample A either way-- that might be my fault though for not quite increasing the exposure enough. After putting a greyscale mask over each to get them nearly identical in brightness and then removing that mask you can see that the overall color values are indeed slightly different. Can you tell in this image below though? Not really right? Auto WB on recent cameras and especially nice DSLRs is very good. On my D800 it is nearly spot on to what I wanted and saw perceptually nearly every time. Keep in mind though that white balance can be set to meter very differently even within the same camera. Just in the same way that you can choose spot/average metering for metering your exposure.

Indeed even though there are variations it probably doesn't matter too much at least here perceptually that twistedraven used auto WB. I can barely see it on a large swath on my calibrated monitor and it isn't going to be super apparent on a .jpg converted to web use... assuming both .jpgs are tagged in the same color profile. So yeah... the color is pretty accurate here--- at least the differences between the two lights. I wouldn't bother re-shooting it just for this thread twistedraven. The sunlight brightness isn't exactly the same in each image though so maybe try taking each image immediately one after the other in the same spot with same exposure settings.

I'd say go ahead and give your opinion at least on which you like more peeps! The lesson here though is definitely shoot everything the same if you can for beam-shots. Custom white balance that thannnng!!! What cam are you using?

I'd say a true noon sunlight tint would be somewhere between both of the beam-shots shown. We have a noon sun average shown in each image more or less so you can see that neither light is totally correct. B seems to be slightly too warm but less washed out and A is cooler but slightly greenish maybe and less saturated.

It's not a DSLR, and it's an older point-and-shoot: the Panasonic Lumix TZ5. When I bought it years back after lots and lots of research it seemed to have the best mix of quality and features. Of course, being a non-dslr, it's really only good for outdoor shots like this. Indoor shots are hard to get accurate, even while on a tripod and with long exposure times.

I will reshoot anyways because I'm an artist with OCD.

Nice. Me too with the OCD. Most artists have a perfection tendency. Yeah, with point and shoots you may have full controls over the exposure or not. Varies from cam to cam.

Random Dan said:

I prefer A, but B certainly isn't bad.

Click to expand...

The question wasn't which one you prefer, though. Which do you think more closely resembles sunlight? Does that change your answer?

B, because it appears to renders the colors more realistically, making them "pop" with a more 3D appearance, while A seems to have a flattening effect on the colors.

On the other hand, if you're asking which of the flashlights makes the shaded area appear more like the washed out sunlit area in the bottom of the photograph, then I suppose that would be A, because it makes the leaves looked washed out as well.

Subject B.

A looks closer to the sunlight you have, b looks like the sun in an hour or so after the photos .

Looks like B has more reds than A, A looks like a cooler white lower CRI led, relatively subtle difference because each zone still receive a fair amount of sunlight.

Edit: It's also pretty obvious in the A picture that sunlight has a lot more red than A light when looking at the lighter shade dead leaves