More on Black & White....

Energised by the idea of posting a few more of my own images, and the exercise of looking at B&W images, I downloaded an ebook from Light Stalking. It was only $7 on special sale and, given the length of it, would hardly have been worth the full $30 that (apparently) it normally costs.

But sometimes less is more, and I liked the fact that the author keeps it simple. Key messages are:

• Don't use the in camera B&W function (doubt anyone does);
• Shoot in RAW (guess most people do);
• Not all images suit B&W (fair point);
• Look for following criteria for images that will convert most successfully:
• Good range of brightness across the image;
• Directional lighting with plenty of highlights and shadows;
• Plenty of surface texture.

He uses Photoshop for conversion using B&W in Adjustment Layer. I have Silver Efex Pro, which many say is the best conversion software. However I have become lazy with it: overusing presets and not exploring the functionality of the software enough. This short course gave me a bit of a kick up backside to do so, in particular using the colour filters and control points; I know how to use them but not used them enough recently, instead over processing before converting, as can be seen with a couple of images in the previous post. 

So message is: be more selective about the images one wishes to convert, and use the functions of SEP more. There is a good case for using to convert, then touch up using Adobe Camera Raw or Photoshop, as I did with the last image below.

One thing I disagreed with is author's dismissal of using presets. I have become lazy using them but they are a good start (and pretty much worked straightaway with the forest image); just need to realise most images require a little more tweaking.

I did the assignment he set in the course: converting two images (one that fitted the above criteria well, the other less so) then chose two more Offa's Dyke images to practise myself, using the section criteria. The results and commentary are below: