White balance and colour
There are six colour modes available, and having used them all I am happy with the results from the standard colour mode, in which tones are very punchy and realistic. On a bright sunny day, blues in the sky and greens in the fields are good straight out of the camera. However, when using the vivid or scenery modes, the saturation is pushed a little too far to be believable. Of course, each colour mode can be tweaked for contrast, saturation, sharpness and noise reduction, according to taste, with a custom setting possible to create a preferred setting. Having shot our colour chart for the entire ISO range under the same lighting conditions, I am impressed with how the colours are faithfully rendered and remain vivid, despite the presence of noise at the higher settings.
One of the direct controls on the four-way rear pad is for white balance, where the choice between auto white balance (AWB), five presets and two custom settings can be made. The AWB setting performs as I would expect it to for a camera at this level, not always being spot on and often reducing colour tones to give a neutral result. To keep the warmth of a sunset or the greens in a forest, it is therefore good practice to use the appropriate preset.
