White balance White balance is a setting on a camera which removes unrealistic color casts from a pictures appearance. This results in a photograph which looks natural and relates to its tone e.g. warm or cool.
It is used by choosing one of the white balance pre-sets including fluorescent, cloudy, flash and more. However the most commonly used setting is auto which automatically puts white balance into place. White balance is used to take into account the “colour temperature” of a light source which refers to the warmth or coolness of white light. It is also used to improve a photo's quality.
There are also different casts you can set if the picture is not correct for example cloudy which will warm up a cooler tone in a picture , shade which gives you more natural-looking skin tones. It is designed for open shade under a blue sky. Also there is incandescent which corrects color more efficiently than auto balance
below are some pictures of different settings of white-balance which clearly shows the various outcomes
from left to right - daylight, shade, white fluorescent light , flash and tungsten. The pictures go from warm to cool as the settings progress giving the images a different look and feel.