Most of us take white balance for granted. We trust the camera to get the colour right for us in almost all our photos. When a subject is illuminated by light, its colour is impacted by the colour of the illuminating light. People see a sheet of paper as white regardless of whether it is illuminated with daylight, tungsten light or fluorescent. White balance is the process the camera uses to give a good representation of the subject under a variety of light sources. When there are multiple light sources influencing the frame, the process becomes much more complex. A portrait by a window might have warm tungsten light in the room, daylight from the window and a flash on the camera all illuminating the subject with different colours of light.
Automatic whiteRAW, then the white balance may be changed after the shot is taken, but the different algorithms in each software process white balance using their own algorithms, not the one built in to your camera’s DIGIC processor. This means you may see differences between Canon’s Digital Photo Professional, and Adobe and Capture One software when processing the same RAW image.
