Best way to capture B&W images

[Tri Danimal]

I am looking to try to capture Black and White landscape images. I am wondering if it is better to capture in camera B&W or to convert to B&W in post? Is there a difference between the two? I know capturing on a Mono camera would be the best option but a dedicated camera is not in the plans.

[pschlute]

Shoot raw and convert in post. Your computer software can have a lot more options than your camera software.

The raw data is captured in colour whichever option you choose.

[Geoff F]

There are several ways to convert colour to B&W with varying results. The best of them allows for plenty of personal artistic choice while auto in camera conversion relies on a basic default setting. What software do you have?

[Manfred M]

Funny timing. I'm just working on putting together a course on this subject that I am supposed to deliver this fall at one of the photo clubs I'm a member of.

The first recommendation that I would make is set your camera to take B&W jpeg images, if it has that mode. That way you can see a fairly decent B&W image on your camera screen. Set the camera to capture raw + JPEG to give yourself maximum flexibility. The hardest part for someone just starting to shoot B&W is to look at a scene that is coloured and visually understand how it will translate into B&W.

Depending on your editing software, you might or might not have a lot of choice in how you convert your images to B&W. I tend to use Photoshop in my work and there are several different options open to use. Lightroom has a B&W converter as well, but it is rather limited in what you can do with it. Some people like using plug ins, like Nik Silver Efex Pro to do their conversions.

There tend to be two approaches that I refer to as "early" conversion and "late" conversion. Early conversion is converting to B&W quite early in your work flow and editing the image as a B&W while others prefer the late option where they edit to get the colour version of the image looking the way they want it before converting to B&W. I use the "early" approach.

[DanK]

You left out the critical bit of information: will you be shooting raw or JPEG?

My advice, for what it is worth, is this:

1. For B&W, never shoot (only) JPEG. If you do, you are giving up all control over the conversion, for no real gain.

2. If you are shooting raw and know in advance that you want B&W, then I would do the same thing Manfred does: change the camera to B&W--which as Peter said has no effect on the raw file--so that you get an approximation of what the conversion will look like.

3. I virtually never shoot raw+JPEG and rarely store JPEGs on my computer. I shot that way for a short time when I started shooting raw years ago but quickly realized that I was just deleting the JPEGs. But to each his or her own. That isn't really relevant to you question about conversion.

4. If you are printing, there is another complication. Years ago, I read a piece by Tim Grey recommending that when printing B&W--and only when printing B&W--you should give control of color to the printer's firmware rather than to software. I print only with Canon printers, so I can't speak to Epson drivers, but in my experience, his advice is correct. I printed the identical B&W image both ways with a printer I used to use, probably a pro 1000, and there was a slight color cast when I gave software control of colors. With canon printers, this requires that you tell the firmware that is a black and white print as well as telling the printing software to give control to the printer.

Manfred, you wrote that Lightroom's conversion is limited compared with Photoshop's? Can you explain? They look very similar to me, if you don't want to add a tint. Photoshop provides 5 color sliders to allow you to darken or lighten colored areas separately. Lightroom has the same feature, but with 8 colors rather than 5. Lightroom does lack the tinting function in the conversion dialog. Is it lacking something else--again, assuming that one wants simply B&W?

[xpatUSA]

I am looking to try to capture Black and White landscape images. I am wondering if it is better to capture in camera B&W or to convert to B&W in post? Is there a difference between the two? I know capturing on a Mono camera would be the best option but a dedicated camera is not in the plans.

Hello Daniel,

I too can't quite afford a Monochrom!

However there is a way to get similar without too much fuss!

Shoot raw, use something such as RawDigger to extract one of the four channels. What you get is monochrome data, weighted according to which channel you extract ... R, G1, B or G2. I just tried it on this .RW2 file (embedded JPEG shown):



I used the G2 export from RawDigger and edited it in FastStone Viewer real quick:



This being a rather conventional Forum, I'm not claiming this is the "best way" to get B&W.

Four files here if anyone wants to play ...

[Manfred M]

Manfred, you wrote that Lightroom's conversion is limited compared with Photoshop's? Can you explain? They look very similar to me, if you don't want to add a tint. Photoshop provides 5 color sliders to allow you to darken or lighten colored areas separately. Lightroom has the same feature, but with 8 colors rather than 5. Lightroom does lack the tinting function in the conversion dialog. Is it lacking something else--again, assuming that one wants simply B&W?

Dan - answer your question...

In Photoshop one can do direct conversions by changing the mode to grayscale, use the B&W conversation (either an adjustment or adjustment layer) and one can use the channel mixer (again as an adjustment or an adjustment layer).

I generally use a channel mixer adjustment layer as the tool is a lot simpler than the B&W adjustment; three channels rather than six used in the B&W adjustment (which is the same as Lightroom). The Channel Mixer adjustment layer is my preferred approach and I will go with R=30, G=59 and B=11 as my starting point. This tool even lets me know if I exceed 100% in my totals when I tweak my channels.

I can also apply the B&W as a filter using the Camera Raw Filter and apply it to a SmartObject, if I want to be able to go back and tweak my selections later on.

If I really wanted to (and this can be done in Lightroom too, I could just desaturate the image. I've seen some people use this approach, but I generally don't like the outcome.

[DanK]

Hello Daniel,

I too can't quite afford a Monochrom!

However there is a way to get similar without too much fuss!

Shoot raw, use something such as RawDigger to extract one of the four channels. What you get is monochrome data, weighted according to which channel you extract ... R, G1, B or G2. I just tried it on this .RW2 file (embedded JPEG shown):



I used the G2 export from RawDigger and edited it in FastStone Viewer real quick:



This being a rather conventional Forum, I'm not claiming this is the "best way" to get B&W.

Four files here if anyone wants to play ...

Nope, it's not, if I understand what you did. the conversation between me and Manfred involves how one can manipulate all of the color channels to change a black and white image. A simple example: people used to use red filters to darken blue skies. One can do that in post by darkening the blues, relative to the other channels.

[DanK]

I generally use a channel mixer adjustment layer as the tool is a lot simpler than the B&W adjustment; three channels rather than six used in the B&W adjustment (which is the same as Lightroom). The Channel Mixer adjustment layer is my preferred approach and I will go with R=30, G=59 and B=11 as my starting point.

Well, this opened a Pandora's box for me. The BW conversion in lightroom is now fundamentally different from what it was before this month. It used to be that you changed to B&W in the HSL panel. Now you do it in the basic panel, and when you do that, LR automatically applies a new profile, "Adobe Monochrome." I thought I once saw but now can't find the RGB values for this. To confuse things further, if you go to the BW panel and click "auto", it changes the values for the color channels (there are now 8). I don't know what values that gives either. And there are a bunch of other monochrome profiles tucked away in the profile browser. I'll have to look more when I have time.

My main preference in doing this is having control over the luminosity of the color channels separately, and both do provide that.

[xpatUSA]

Nope, it's not, if I understand what you did. the conversation between me and Manfred involves how one can manipulate all of the color channels to change a black and white image. A simple example: people used to use red filters to darken blue skies. One can do that in post by darkening the blues, relative to the other channels.

My post was addressing Daniel's comment "I know capturing on a Mono camera would be the best option". I offered a poor man's alternative, so to speak, but thank you for the education.

[Tri Danimal]

to answer some questions that have been asked:
1) I usually shoot in RAW + JPEG ( this allows me to quickly sort out the "bad" photos prior to loading into Lightroom, then delete the JPEGS ones in Lightroom)

2) I use Lightroom and occasionally use photoshop, I need to get better at photoshop.

3) I am 92.35982% sure that my A7iii has the option to capture B&W images in camera.

[pschlute]

I am 92.35982% sure that my A7iii has the option to capture B&W images in camera.

Your camera will "capture" the image in only one way by recording all the raw data the sensor captures. Any setting you choose in-camera for b+w output is a conversion by the camera's software from that raw data.

[Manfred M]

Every camera is a bit different. I knew that I could capture TIFF files in-camera and I just tried it while set to B&W mode and got a very large (100+ MB) B&W TIFF image capture.

Less useful than using a converter, but still interesting from a purely academic standpoint.