White balance is a camera setting that adjusts the color temperature of your footage so that whites appear neutral under different lighting conditions. It corrects for color casts from light sources like tungsten, daylight, or fluorescent bulbs.
Accurate white balance ensures that skin tones, environments, and product colors look natural and consistent. Misbalanced footage can look amateur, unflattering, or just plain wrong.
Set your white balance before shooting based on the lighting environment (e.g., 5600K for daylight, 3200K for tungsten). Use presets, manual Kelvin settings, or custom white balance with a neutral reference like a gray card.
Match lighting conditions – Set white balance to the dominant light source (daylight, tungsten, fluorescent).
Use reference tools – Employ gray cards or white balance cards for accuracy.
Lock settings – Avoid auto white balance in multi-shot setups to maintain consistency.