Canon Digital Rebel pictures coming out too red

I'm a real beginner at all this digital stuff. I held onto my film as long as I could. Part of the problem with my film is that when I went to publishing some of my pictures would come out with too much red. Especially people. We are asian with yellow undertones if that makes a difference. Anyway, now that I have my Canon Digital Rebel my pictures are still coming out with that red tone. I go in and adjust the color but there must be something I can do so I don't have to adjust every picture. That defeats the purpose of going digital. I mostly take pictures of my children so Autofocus is on. Is this a white balance problem? Anyone know if I can adjust my white balance if I use Autofocus. I hope someone can help.

Hello, and welcome to the community!

There's a lot that could be causing your problem but I'm confident that it can be solved if you have a little patience.

Let me ask you a question or two to get "the ball rolling":

1. When you talk about your pictures coming up with too much red after publising what exactly do you mean? Are you talking about prints, looking at your monitor, or perhaps something else? In other words, what physical thing are you looking at when you're evaluating the redness?

2. Can you please post an UNEDITED (straight from the camera without trying to fix anything) photo that illustrates a worse case scenario of your problem?

3. Finally, post the same photo again but this time apply the changes you'd normally make so that it doesn't come out so red.

The purpose of having the two photos is to judge what you expect versus what you're getting. It also allows me to judge just how bad things are for you. Trust me when I tell you that posting the unedited and edited version of a example photo will tell me much more than any words you can type at this point.

Once again, welcome to the community here. You'll find lots of helpful folks.

Thanks...for the info. I told you I'm new to this new technology right. Well, I don't know how to get the picture on this board. Please tell me how and I'll do it. I have the pictures on CD right now so once I figure out how to attach it I will. Sorry attaching a picture seems so easy but I can't figure out how to do it here.

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Originally Posted by Trevor Ash

Hello, and welcome to the community!

There's a lot that could be causing your problem but I'm confident that it can be solved if you have a little patience.

Let me ask you a question or two to get "the ball rolling":

1. When you talk about your pictures coming up with too much red after publising what exactly do you mean? Are you talking about prints, looking at your monitor, or perhaps something else? In other words, what physical thing are you looking at when you're evaluating the redness?

2. Can you please post an UNEDITED (straight from the camera without trying to fix anything) photo that illustrates a worse case scenario of your problem?

3. Finally, post the same photo again but this time apply the changes you'd normally make so that it doesn't come out so red.

The purpose of having the two photos is to judge what you expect versus what you're getting. It also allows me to judge just how bad things are for you. Trust me when I tell you that posting the unedited and edited version of a example photo will tell me much more than any words you can type at this point.

Once again, welcome to the community here. You'll find lots of helpful folks.

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click the "go advanced" button right below the quick reply box, and it will take you to a reply page. Under the text box on that page you should find a section that allows you to upload your picture. it will be titled "attach files" and you click the "upload photos" button. Or, an alternative is to use imageshack.us to host your picture, and then post the link to your photo.

When you reply to a post (like you've already done) scroll down a little bit below the window where you're typing your reply and you'll see a button called "upload photos". You need to hit that button.

Also, before posting, you'll need to size your photos so that they're smaller than 640 pixels on the longest dimension. Hopefully you already know how to do that!

If you get stuck again just ask for more help, there's plenty of us that have computer furstrations!

And also keep the file size to below 195k as well, otherwise it won't load up.

wow, thats pretty cool. not only are you from hawaii, but you are from mililani too! anyway, if you still need help uploading, just say so.

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Originally Posted by zesty-man

wow, thats pretty cool. not only are you from hawaii, but you are from mililani too! anyway, if you still need help uploading, just say so.

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Hey, Zesty Man if you see someone at the Waipio Costco not knowing how to put the compact flash into that machine....it's probably me. I'm really trying hard to get out of the dark ages and get with this digital stuff. It's really tempting to go back to my trusty ol' film. Thanks to everyone here I think I won't go back just yet.

O.K. guys...here goes I'm going to try loading those pictures. When I processed them they're not as bad as they appear on my monitor or when we put them on the t.v....but they're still a little red.

O.K. having technical difficulties...but I'm learning. I have to send this reply in and then change computers. If I'm succesful I can upload from the computer the images are downloaded on.

Here are my 2 pictures. I made them to the smallest setting. Let me know if they're too small to tell the difference. I'm learning. Thanks everybody. Now, I can resize a file and even e mail it.

Wow...these pictures are BIG. O.K. someone tell me what I did wrong. Anyway, the one on top is the one I retouched. Actually I shouldn't have taken so much red out...but if you see compared to the bottom it's less red. The guy in the picture is dark but he's not that dark. This was taken indoor at night with flash if that helps. I left my rebel on auto eveything. I think I read on here not to use that green auto mode. Thanks Eveybody!!!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVEYBODY!!!! I know Flashram_Peter_AUS you're in Australia so if I'm not mistaken you'll see the new year first. Since I probably see the New Year Last here in Hawaii it might be coming your way real soon.

Hi Iko:
The colors actually look pretty good to me on my monitor. It might just be a little over saturated making our Pacific Islander skin tones look somewhat Native American. If you check your manual, I believe there is a way to change the color saturation and color balance in the menu setup of your camera. I know there is on all of our EOS digi SLRs at work, so you may be able to as well on your digiRebel. I personally like the over saturated look, but then of course, I'm a big fan of Fujichrome Velvia film (which is WAY over the top oversaturated-not good for Pacific Islander skin tones). If you can't change the color balance or color saturation settings, then I guess you can edit all your people shots in photoshop or other editing program, or you can send the camera back to be calibrated for the color balance/saturation level you like.
Leon

Hello again. I'm glad you got the pictures posted. They're not too big so don't worry about that.

I spent some time looking at your photos and trying to determine whether there is a "fault" here. I think I'm going to agree with the other posters and say that the problem is that the colors just aren't to your tastes. In other words, the camera is taking photos more saturated in color than you prefer. There's nothing wrong with that, and I often think it's over saturated as well.

Let's focus on putting control back into your hands!

Lionheart already mentioned changing color saturation in a menu of your camera. You should look into that and experiment. Set it lower than it currently is and see if the photos better meet your tastes.

Another thing that is contributing to the over saturated look in this particular photo at least is the exposure. While the boy is exposed pretty well, the man has much darker skin and is receiving much less light from the flash. Darker colors almost always appear more saturated. In this case, since he has a reddish skin tone it's going to appear more saturated than normal. Being behind the boy, and having been shot at such a close range, the light from the flash will fall off at a quicker rate than if you were further away. The ambient light is also contributing ever so slightly in this particular photo in making the mans skin the way it is.

In the end, I think Lionheart is right about the saturation and your personal tastes. You can tell how saturated the photo is simply by looking at the turquoise in the boy's shirt. It seems a little unnatural.

This is a nice family photo by the way. With or without the corrections. Let us know if the saturation change in the camera solved your problem. It's found somewhere in the main menu under "Parameters". Use a custom parameter set (Set 1) and set contrast +1, saturation 0, sharpness +1. Or experiment with the others to see their effect.

Trevor Ash & Lionheart-Thanks a million. I went into the setting you posted and changed the setting. I even found skin tone in there so I took it down one. The color is coming out great now. Wow, the help you can get with the internet....and to think I was ready to sell my camera on EBAY and go back to film.
I'm having a bit of a problem with the flash now...but I haven't figured out what's happening so I can't even ask for help. I can take one picture and it'll be really dark then I'll take another picture exactly same setting and same people, it'll come out o.k. I'm not sure if it's my focus points that are off. I think I have the setting on "P" not the green box ( fully auto). I deleted the dark ones before thinking about posting it here to see if you guys could figure it out. So, until I get more like that I'll just be reading posts. Thanks again.

how far away are your subjects? this could mean the difference between a well lit subject and a dark subject, especially with a built in flash, which I am assuming you're using, correct me if I'm wrong. If you take one picture with the subject close, they will be well lit, but if they're a bit farther away, the not-so-powerful built in flash won't be able to reach far enough.

I played with my camera again tonight to see if I could duplicate my problem. Tonight they either came out overexposed ( I think that's what you call it- too light) or o.k. I'll post them so you can see. One set is on everything auto ( the green box) and the other is in "P" so I've figured out it's not the mode. These pictures are being taken right after the other so maybe like 10 seconds difference if that. I hope someone will tell me it's the setting and then it'll be fixed like my color was. I'm trying to figure out how to use this camera before I go on a trip. I hope by then I'll be able to ask someone to take a picture for me and the settings will be all set they just push the button.

These were taken on the green button full auto