[Buckeyemikie]

I've been photographing my granddaughter's soccer team's night games with my KP (no flash). The color temperatures are radically different (by thousands of degrees) in consecutive images shot with the 60-250 & the 70-210 lenses. They are fine in the first image, then the next one or two are much darker (see attached) and the same pattern continues through over 100 shots. On the second night with the 70-210, I changed to AWB from multi AWB with the same result.

My capture mode was Tav with ISOs ranging from 5000 to as much as 40000, F4 @1/800, ISO auto, AF.c, cont. shooting (H), center weighted metering. I'm wondering if there's something wrong with the KP's metering? Any help greatly appreciated.

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[sergysergy]

Things that might have to do with it: was some kind of bracketing mode on? If not maybe it has to do with the lights in the stadium? You can see similar effects in videos depending on the fps (flickering?).

[AstroDave]

The color temperatures are radically different (by thousands of degrees) in consecutive images shot with the 60-250 & the 70-210 lenses.

I'm not sure about the KP, but for both the K-3 and K-1, somewhere in the C menus are options to take control of the white balance setting away from the camera. (It likes to think it is smarter than you, and will vary the WB - I've had several bouts of seeing similar effects.)

[robgski]

Are you letting using Automatic White Balance or are you setting it manually?

[Adam]

Could it be related to the flickering of the lights illuminating the field?

[C_Jones]

If you are in TAV mode each shot will most likely be evaluated slightly differently by the camera. If you use Manual instead, first adjusting your settings by focusing on a commonly lighted section of your shooting area, then you will most likely get shots which are similar in output. Also, as has been said, the lighting at night can affect your output, depending on if the light is flickering and also if the lighting on the field differs or is consistent on most of the field. So, as I said I would do some test shots in Manual, such as focusing on a part of the field itself that is moderately lit, and adjust from there as needed while shooting, not straying too far from original settings. You may want to start using AWB, and if it is not satisfying you can go into your white balance menu and adjust it by setting the Kelvin temperature yourself. When you are adjusting it (the Kelvin temperature), if you are in live view, you will be able to see in the live view screen how the different Kelvin settings affect the scene the camera is viewing, and when you get to a look that you want, you can select that Kelvin temperature. As I said though, if the light is flickering, that may be having an overall affect on the outcome of your shots.

[bschriver11]

I have had this happen as well on different cameras under artificial lighting, I believe it is flickering in the lights but it happens so fast that it is not perceived by the human eye. Shoot in RAW and adjust white balance in post.

[pschlute]

If not maybe it has to do with the lights in the stadium?

I think this is the problem. The shutter speed at 1/800 is faster than the frequency of the lights.

A slower shutter speed will likely not show the issue

[ramseybuckeye]

I think it is the lights also, it may be the frequency, but it may just be the different levels of light that the camera will detect but the eye will not. Most high school and even many college fields do not have the lights that we are used to seeing when we watch sports on TV. These fields have areas that are darker and brighter, your eyes can adjust faster and better than a camera can.

[77me]

My guess is the entire rack of lights are on 1 phase instead of having lights wired to all 3 phases. Since all the lights are on a single phase, the power / color temp will cycle and you will see the different color casts.

[Buckeyemikie]

Thx for all of your replies. All were relevant & helpful.

After further adjustments of the raw images in Lightroom, I found by reducing color temperature and moving the tint slider from magenta toward green resulted in a much closer match. I’m going to review your suggestions before I photograph another night event in hopes of avoiding the extra post-prosessing.