Unusual color shifts and white balance issues have been reported periodically with different brands and models of cameras on DCT going all the way back to 2013. Brands have included Street Guardian, Mobius, Finevue and a few others I can't recall.
Basically, the camera's white balance algorithm suddenly overreacts to some sort of visual stimulus within the scene and then overshoots the white balance target. In most cases the stimulus is an object or more with a significant amount of one RGB color or another within the FOV that triggers a color shift towards the opposite color in the RGB model. So a RED object may trigger a shift to CYAN, which is opposite RED in the RGB model. A YELLOW scene or object may trigger an overreaction in white balance to the BLUE end of the spectrum which is opposite YELLOW on the color chart. Shifts to the opposite color are not always the case. Occasionally, an object without any noticeable specific RGB color enters the view and triggers a color shift, like the windshield wiper in my first video example below but I find this to be rare.
The color shifts seen in this A229 Pro video are unusual because whatever is triggering them is
very subtle. I am wondering how common this issue is with the A229? Maybe this one is just a bad sensor or something.
As I recall, this can be a tricky problem to fix if it is a firmware issue but camera developers eventually do resolve the problem. Of any manufacturer, I'm sure
@viofo will sort this out sooner than later.
Here are a few examples of extreme sudden color shifts that I've personally experienced in the past with Mobius cameras.
Notice in this next video how the color shift to CYAN occurs just after a RED car, RED buildings and RED stop sign (and also the red shutters on the building across the road) enter the scene and then, after I turn the corner when the RED buildings are no longer in the image and the Cyan color cast disappears and the color balance returns to normal.
CYAN is directly opposite RED in the RGB color wheel chart.
(BTW, this makes me suspicious of the hood of the intensely RED car in the A229 video posted by
@taaatooo above, as it may be influencing how the camera is reacting to the rest of the colors in the scene at any given moment.)
Here we see BLUE shift to RED (ish). BLUE can be considered "normal" here because of the time of day and year at this latitude (winter dusk in Northern New England) as well as the weather conditions.
Notice that when all three RGB colors (RED-GREEN-BLUE) are combined you get WHITE in the middle of the chart.
RGB is an
additive color model. If you
add the proper amounts of RED, GREEN & BLUE along with the proper amounts of the secondary color combinations of CYAN, MAGENTA & YELLOW you achieve what is commonly referred to as WHITE BALANCE. All digital cameras and computer screens use the RGB color model.
Here are two side by side screen shots from a video shot in Sweden using a Street Guardian SG9665GC.
The DCT member no longer visits the forum and his videos are now labeled as private so, unfortunately I am unable to post them.
Just after he is leaving a tunnel bathed in YELLOW incandescent lighting, the scene shifts dramatically to BLUE.
Notice that BLUE is directly opposite from the secondary color YELLOW in the RGB color wheel chart.
This is evidence that the camera is overshooting the mark when it tries to adjust the white balance to compensate for all the YELLOW in the first image.
Every camera that has a color shift issue usually has one particular color issue such has RED to CYAN or YELLOW to BLUE or some other RGB color interaction with an opposite color within the color model such as GREEN to MAGENTA.
So in most cases, when the camera sees an abundance of a primary RGB color in the real world it tends to overshoot in the video towards a secondary RGB color bias within the model. In some cases, as with this shift from YELLOW to BLUE, the secondary color YELLOW is triggering a shift to the Primary RGB color BLUE.
).