You need to know how to set your white balance so you're photos are the correct colour. It's the first step in a colour managed workflow. So why is White balance so important?
Light has many different colours. Even daylight changes colour as we go from warm reds around sunrise, through cooler colours at mid day and back to red again round sunset. If it's cloudy the light will be blue and in sunshine it'll have a yellow content. Shade is similar to cloud in it's blueishness (think I just invented that word) and domestic light can be all sorts of colours.
White balance is measured in degrees Kelvin which give you what's called your colour temperature. You don't really need to worry about the numbers, but I think it's interesting to know white balance and how it's measured begins in a blacksmith's forge! See our white balance film at www.photographycourses.biz/whi... to see for yourself.
By setting your white balance for the light that's falling onto your subject your camera will get the colours closer to being accurate which means less time spent fiddling with settings in a photo editor like Photoshop.
In this video we'll take some pictures and show you how to set your white balance for different lighting situations - and what happens when you don't.