Black and White Photography Tip
Back and White from Colour
Of course, the best way to create black and white photographs is to shoot in black
and white to begin with. However, if you find yourself in a situation where you
only have colour film, or that your digital camera does not have a black and white
mode, you will have to convert the image at a later stage.
De-saturate the image
There are several ways that you can produce black and white prints on a computer,
and the simplest is to De-saturate. While this will give you an idea of what the
image will look like in black and white, it is a particularly crude method and the
chances are that the image will look fiat, especially in the highlights and shadows.
RGB channel mixer
A tar better method is to use Channel Mixer or similar option. You can now use the
three channels, red, green and blue, to adjust the tones of the image. In the wet
darkroom, different developers and grades of paper - soft, grade 1 or hard, grade
5 - were selected to obtain the tonal range that best suited the image. You can
think of the Channel Mixer in much the same way as these grades and apply them in
varying degrees to obtain the best tonal range. Later, the Brightness/Contrast control
in can be used to further tweak the image. Certain areas can also be masked off
to make them either brighter or flatter.
Documentary photography
Documentary photography is a way of telling a story through a selection of pictures.
Although they could be accompanied with text, it will be the pictures that attract
the readers. It can
be
applicable to any theme, but in black and white photography it is normally associated
with war, social or environmental issues that have been shot in a gritty way.
Photo Reportage
Another way of describing this type of photography is photo reportage. The essence
of this style is to convey as much, varied information as possible in just a few
images. Historically, there is a long line of great documentary photographers like
Walker Evans, Eve Arnold, Bill Brandt and Don McCullen whose powerful images featured
in magazines. Although you might not have the benefit of time to research a particular
story, it will pay to write down the essential elements of what you are going to
photograph, both to focus the mind and to equip yourself properly. For example if
your story includes people then strong portraits of interesting faces will be on
your list. This will require a telephoto lens n the range of 100mm to enable you
to get n close and fill the frame. A longer lens will enable you o take candid shots
as well as bringing distant objects closer.
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