White Balance: The Difference Between Pretty and Dog Pee

You know what’s been driving me CRAZY for nearly 2 years? The pictures I put up of Leyna’s nursery right before she was born. Oh, they were SUCH a white-balance nightmare.

I mean, it’s not like I really knew exactly WHY they looked like a dog pissed all over them back then, but I knew something was amiss. I was too tired and fat and pregnant to care, and then I was too tired and covered in breast milk and newborn snuggles to care… and then I sort of forgot about it.

Until I saw a picture pop up on Pinterest and thought, “OMG! That looks like shit!”

So, knowing a little more about how to fix those problems in Lightroom now (and smacking the old me for not taking the pictures DURING THE DAY WITH NATURAL LIGHT), I was able to go back and doctor them a little bit.

For those of you who have Lightroom 3 (that’s the version I have, so I’m not sure if it’s the same in the other versions… might be), and are wondering how to make your pictures look less yellow or less blue, it’s an easy fix in your “Basic” panel in “Develop” module.

Before

The fix: I moved the temp slider to the left to -27 and the tint slider to the left to -6

After

I know it’s still not some sort of photographic masterpiece, and I wouldn’t say the WB is spot on now, because it may be a little purple, but that was hard for me to fix with all the purples naturally in the room. The point is, at least it doesn’t look like a dog peed all over it now.

So, I re-reveal Leyna’s PB&J Tiny Traveler Nursery. 

Why did I not just retake the pictures? Because it’s at that weird transition phase between a nursery and a toddler room and sort of a mess.

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