Photographic Term of the Week: Color Temperature
Color Temperature is the description of the color of a light source. Expressed in degrees Kelvin, it’s based on an ideal radiator of light at a particular temperature. Daylight is usually thought of as 5500˚K, incandescent usually 3200˚ or 3400˚ Perceptually, our brains don’t see this difference in color easily, but photographic sensors and films do. Manual or automatic color balance is fairly easily achieved with digital still and video cameras, but situations with differing light sources and therefore differing color temperatures can present challenges.
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