White balance is a function commonly used in video cameras and digital cameras. The human eye can identify the same color in various objects under different lighting conditions; however, a video camera or digital camera cannot. These devices perceive color depending on the hue of the incident light. The white balance function can be used to improve color rendering in recorded images.

In automatic mode, the device identifies the brightest point and uses it as a reference for white. Based on that, it can determine the temperature of other colors in the image. Color temperature is measured in degrees Kelvin. The color temperature is determined by the type of light. This means that with an increase in color temperature, the light appears colder (from 5,500 to 10,000 K), and with a decrease in color temperature, the light appears warmer (from 3,000 to 5,000 K).

Almost all surveillance cameras have an advanced AWB (Automatic White Balance) function to adjust colors to the light at different temperatures. AWB eliminates unrealistic colors. Its goal is to compensate for the prevailing color to generate images as they appear to the human eye.

Another advanced function is ATW (Automatic Tracking White Balance), an extension of AWB. This function analyzes all image areas for different white values. Unlike cameras with automatic white balance, ATW cameras have a built-in white balance reference for correct white rendering even in uniformly colored scenes.

An informative example of what white balance looks like is visible in the title image.