Selecting a White Balance Mode (M-REC Mode Only)

Available White Balance Modes

The 950 have an automatic algorithm for selecting a "correct" color temperature. And, both permit the user to overwrite this automatic capability by indicating a particular color temperature to be used. Based on the range of color temperatures, 950 has the following categories: (1) automatic, (2) sunny, (3) cloudy, (4) flash, (5) fluorescent light, (6) incandescent light, and (7) white balance preset. The first one permits the camera to find the "best" possible white balance. This is a very convenient mode and should be correct for most situations. The last is the most flexible one because we can tell the in-camera algorithm what the white color looks like under the current lighting situation. If you are not satisfied with your result with the other modes, give this one a try. All the other five have their usual meaning and do not require further explanation.

Selecting a Color Temperature

In A-REC, only Auto is available. To use the other modes, the camera must be in M-REC. The following is a procedure for selecting a white balance mode:

1. Enter the M-REC mode.
2. Press the MENU button. The first menu item is WHITE BALANCE and the icon to its left shows the current white balance mode:
   

3. Press the shutter release button to select the WHITE BALANCE menu.
4. All seven modes are listed on the next screen as shown below. Use W to move down and T to move up.
   

5. Once the desired mode is highlighted, press the shutter-release button to make a selection.

After selecting a white balance mode, its icon appears on the LCD monitor and on the first column of the white balance selection menu. However, no icon will be shown when AUTO is selected. The following images illustrate the selected white balance mode and the location of the white balance icon (i.e., incandescent light) on the LCD monitor.

Incandescent selected	LCD monitor

The following table shows the keywords and their corresponding icons.

White Balance Mode	Keyword	Icon
Automatic	AUTO
White Balance Preset	WHITE PRESET
Sunlight	SUNNY
Incandescent	INCANDESCENT
Fluorescent	FLUORESCENT
Cloudy/Rainy Day	CLOUDY
Flash light	FLASH

After knowing the meaning of each icon, the 950 has an easy way of selecting a white balance mode using the command dial. Here is the procedure:

1. Enter the M-REC mode.
2. Press the MENU button.
3. Turn the command dial. As the command dial is being turned, the icon of a white balance mode is shown on the first column of the menu.
4. Once the desired mode appears, press the MENU button twice to bail out of the menu and return to shooting mode.

White Balance Preset

The white balance preset mode permits us to tell the camera what the white color should look like in the image under the current color temperature. This mode can help us determine a correct color temperature under some difficult situations. What we have to do is showing to the camera a white paper so that the camera sensor can read off the color temperature information from that white paper and setup the camera's white balance algorithm properly.

After selecting WHITE PRESET, a new screen appears as shown below.

At this point, put a white or light gray paper/object at a well-illuminated location, and point the camera to the white paper so that the image of the white paper covers the small square on the LCD monitor completely without shadow. Then, use the W to move down and highlight MEASURE. Finally, press the shutter-release button. It will take a couple of seconds for the camera to adjust itself. After this is done, the camera will use the "memorized" white color to set its color temperature.