Zv said:
Also in post you want to see and control the amount of color shift as the sun sinks. For example in shot no 1. lets say you correct WB to 5000k and then sync all. Great but now shot 100 is the wrong color because by that point the sun went down and things got cooler and you wanted to preserve that look. Auto is too inconsistent and you'd have to muck about fixing a lot more shots then resyncing. With a fixed value you know how much or how less you need to move it by.
Sorry for removing most of the comments to reply I just wanted to avoid another tunnel thread (there was one where we ended up making fun
).
I do not disagree in concept too much I think. I just believe it is the same with ACR +1 step.
You just mention an example of a 5000K temperature applied to all via sync. Isn't the same if you have it all at 5000K at the time of shooting?
In both cases you would do either:
1. minor tweeks to some and/or
2. preserve the look of some.
Either starting from 5500K (or 5000) at the time of shooting or from a set temperature from ACR which by the way may also be the same (say 5500K or 5000)...
So I believe it is just a step difference either way (always talking about raw files)
Now, I have observed that my 5D2 and 5D3 are way off (too warm) at tungsten lighting (as was my 40D). In that case a preset value in K would give better results from the start (which seems to be around 2700K at least for many of my latest interior shooting cases). Still it is not big deal to apply at post and I have the advantage of not forgetting the camera to that value.
It is just the freedom that raw files give us. I believe both ways are acceptable and it actually comes down to personal preference.