When is the best time to white-balance a camera?

The best time to white-balance a camera is under all lighting conditions. White balancing is the process of adjusting the colors in your image to ensure that the white objects in the scene appear white, regardless of the color temperature of the light source. Light sources can have different color temperatures, such as warm tones from incandescent bulbs or cool tones from fluorescent lights, which can significantly alter the appearance of colors in your footage.

By ensuring that you white-balance in a variety of lighting conditions—including natural daylight, artificial lighting, and low light—you create a consistent color representation across your images. This practice helps to maintain accuracy in color reproduction, which is essential in video and photography work. Omitting certain conditions from the white balance process can lead to inconsistent colors when shooting a project under varying lights. Thus, performing white balance correctly across all light scenarios is crucial for producing high-quality visual content.