7 tips to help you create incredible black and white images

[Jeffbridge]

7 tips to help you create incredible black and white images! See them here:

http://www.photographytalk.com/3220-...d-white-images

[tao2]

That person's about as helpful as a chocolate teapot...

My one tip for shooting in black and white? Get a film camera...

[wmoore]

I second Robert and his tip. Shoot black and white film.
Also reading some of the other articles on the Photography talk website, make me cringe how badly written they are.
For example this one http://www.photographytalk.com/4357-...ow-this-advice

[steve welle]

Both responders suggest that film is intrinsically better than digital for black and white. I do not understand why this would be the case. Seems to me that lighting and contrast and sharpness with a good digital camera can match film if you shoot raw and convert to monochrome later so the camera does not make a lousy jpeg first. So what is it about film that makes it better? I never had a good camera in the days when you had to use film, so please excuse my ignorance.

[Downrigger]

Boab leaves out: "and develop the skills necessary to accomplish great results in the darkroom."

It's a vinyl vs. digital/telemark vs. parallel/wool vs. fleece sort of thing, and yes, I walked miles to school in subzero temperatures in my day.

Probably with guidance, individuals lower in the food chain like you and me, Steve, could be able to appreciate distinctions in gallery hung examples of Black and White in the two realms. But I would disagree that one can not, and should not bother to strive to create black and white images in digital that are interesting, or compelling, or beautiful. See for instance the black and whites in the recent National Geographic assignment ( http://yourshot.nationalgeographic.c...ack-and-white/ ) and not know that one cannot achieve great art in digital black and white and that to do so is a worthy goal.

[ajohnw]

Both responders suggest that film is intrinsically better than digital for black and white. I do not understand why this would be the case. Seems to me that lighting and contrast and sharpness with a good digital camera can match film if you shoot raw and convert to monochrome later so the camera does not make a lousy jpeg first. So what is it about film that makes it better? I never had a good camera in the days when you had to use film, so please excuse my ignorance.

It's a mistaken idea about what black and white film photography actually produced based around film that is grainer than it was and also the use of rather hard contrasty printing.

On digital matching film I'm fairly convinced that in colour wide scales use of slide film made that possible but things have moved on since then except in one respect. Some one posted some shots from colour film (negative I assume) and the colours were very close to reality. Digital still doesn't match that but it seems that individually calibrated cameras can. Going on those shots I would say that digital can match colour film now in other respects but often processing makes any judgement difficult. This particular person who posted likes things to be as they are.

Don't think that the 7 tips are much use really. Subject comes first followed by careful processing. I feel I get very close to the real thing at times but still fall short. I'm getting the impression this is down to rather subtle toning on standard grade papers. There are all sorts of shades of white that still look white and I have no idea what sort of white the paper was.

John
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[Manfred M]

As someone who shot B&W film for many years, I think understand where both writers are coming from. Film grain in B&W is a compositional element that cannot be duplicated in digital. Unlike digital noise (especially chromatic noise) which is generally viewed as "bad", grain from high speed film gives your image a gritty look, that in certain instances is quite desireable.

There are a number of software film emulators out there, so you can get close. The downside is of course cost and convenience. If you want to do something digital, add the step of scanning the negatives and dealing with the dust that inevitably gets onto the negative. From a technical standpoint, B&W film is close to, but not quite up to the dynamic range of a modern digital camera.

Digital conversion, on the other hand allows the for controls I was never able to achieve in film. I can play with specific colour channel to enhance the look. Clouds look a bit too light, darken the blue channel to make them "pop". In film I would have had to slap a yellow filter in front of the lens to do this (and this was a fixed process as the shot was recorded on the film).

So film versus digital; somewhat akin to a vinyl record versus an mp3 for music. Both have specific and intrinsic advantages and disadvantages. To me it's not one versus the other, but rather understanding the differences and making the choice based on your own specific requirements. I still shoot film from time to time, but tend to stick to digital purely from a cost and convenience standpoint.

[Shadowman]

Paper choice makes a big difference if printing. I like the look of luster paper for B & W.

[John 2]

For the most part, surely its about and only about the end image not the tools used to achieve it. Film has specific qualities. That can make it usefully different but not universally better. If the final image has the impact that you have in mind, then is doesn't matter how it's been achieved. Colour accuracy is a better argument but only where colour accuracy matters. However, I'm not convinced that the difference between digital colour straight out of the camera is so marked that in most applications it does matter. Poor PP has the potential for making a bigger difference. IMHO of course.

[Ady]

In an entirely unscientific test, i.e. my portfolio being offered up to about a dozen gallery owners, not one could determine with any degree of confidence if the prints had been produced from a film or digital source, that goes for colour and B&W. They all had to ask and a couple were convinced that the person presenting my portfolio was mistaken and some of the prints must have been from film.

A digitally produced B&W image may not look particularly convincing on screen when compared to a high quality scan of a good B&W print, however it does seem that when printed, using continuous tone methods rather than inkjet (the dithered patterns rather give the game away under a loupe) it becomes very difficult to determine which images are digital in origin and which are from film.

I do use DxO filmpack on almost all of my work, maybe this is what throws people. But these days unless I'm pushed on the subject I don't comment on the nature of the source, I like to let folks decide for themselves.

The primary reason my personal work (the for pleasure/art pieces rather than the commercial output) very rarely makes it on to the web is that I like my images on paper and quite often in sizes too large or with an aspect ratio inappropriate for on-screen display. I don't know if it's purely the difference between transmissive and reflective presentation but I don't particularly like the look of a great deal of images when displayed on an LCD panel, but maybe that's just me.

Cheers,
A

[MrB]

For the most part, surely its about and only about the end image not the tools used to achieve it. Film has specific qualities. That can make it usefully different but not universally better. If the final image has the impact that you have in mind, then is doesn't matter how it's been achieved.

+1

Dogmatic statements serve only to irritate. Of course, there are many examples of superb B&W images that originated from negatives, and many that began as files from digital cameras - anyone who has viewed the submissions to this web site has experienced the evidence for that.

Cheers.
Philip

[DanK]

As someone who shot B&W film for many years, I think understand where both writers are coming from. Film grain in B&W is a compositional element that cannot be duplicated in digital. Unlike digital noise (especially chromatic noise) which is generally viewed as "bad", grain from high speed film gives your image a gritty look, that in certain instances is quite desireable.

There are a number of software film emulators out there, so you can get close.
<snip>
Digital conversion, on the other hand allows the for controls I was never able to achieve in film. I can play with specific colour channel to enhance the look. Clouds look a bit too light, darken the blue channel to make them "pop". In film I would have had to slap a yellow filter in front of the lens to do this (and this was a fixed process as the shot was recorded on the film).

I completely agree with this. I shot B&W film for years and did my own darkroom work. I really enjoy the greater flexibility digital provides. I would have used the same example: instead of deciding in advance what filter I wanted, if any, and being stuck with it, I can modify this in post, and I can do it with far more flexibility than I had with a few filters.

Re grain: how fast we forget. yes, sometimes it provided a desired compositional element, but often, that was making a purse out of a sow's ear. Time and time again, I heard people bemoaning that Tri-X was a grainier film than Plus-X but that they had to use it to get the extra stop, or complaining that if they pushed Tri-X to ASA 800, it got REALLY grainy. We were all stuck with it.

Frankly, I spend zero time worrying about this, and my old film camera, as much as I loved it, stays on the shelf. I am more concerned with improving my B&W postprocessing skills. That will make a bigger difference.

Steve--in the film days, it didn't really matter what camera you had. Cameras were just boxes with shutters for holding film and lenses. The film was what mattered.

Philip--I agree about dogmatic statements.

Dan

[ajohnw]

In an entirely unscientific test, i.e. my portfolio being offered up to about a dozen gallery owners, not one could determine with any degree of confidence if the prints had been produced from a film or digital source, that goes for colour and B&W. They all had to ask and a couple were convinced that the person presenting my portfolio was mistaken and some of the prints must have been from film.

A digitally produced B&W image may not look particularly convincing on screen when compared to a high quality scan of a good B&W print, however it does seem that when printed, using continuous tone methods rather than inkjet (the dithered patterns rather give the game away under a loupe) it becomes very difficult to determine which images are digital in origin and which are from film.

I do use DxO filmpack on almost all of my work, maybe this is what throws people. But these days unless I'm pushed on the subject I don't comment on the nature of the source, I like to let folks decide for themselves.

The primary reason my personal work (the for pleasure/art pieces rather than the commercial output) very rarely makes it on to the web is that I like my images on paper and quite often in sizes too large or with an aspect ratio inappropriate for on-screen display. I don't know if it's purely the difference between transmissive and reflective presentation but I don't particularly like the look of a great deal of images when displayed on an LCD panel, but maybe that's just me.

Cheers,
A

That's my impression on a PC screen too. When I look at shots in the B&W competitions I get the impression that many don't have the dynamic range that could be achieved with prints and looked at that way what I see as good has limited but fine tonal range. As my processing changes I feel I am getting closer though even when the shot is using all of the dynamic range on the screen.

Comments about grain cause me some confusion as it's best use from my point of view was for focusing an enlarger - it still needed a microscope like attachment to do that even for 20x16's. I did use some Kodak film initially but like a lot of people over here used Ilford - well the people I knew anyway. I can't recollect really having any problems with HP4 either, the one that was just rebranded to 400 ASA from 200 as more and more cameras had "reasonable" metering. Fine grain film even from Ilford. Never impressed. Actually I don't think many people ever used them.

John
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