Black and White Knowledge

[Wayno]

Hello,
I'd like to advanced my Black and White processing techniques.
Its one thing to get the shot in camera, and another to take it to the next level - processing wise.
Can anyone recommend either a good book, tutorial or web site that point me in the right direction?
I use Lightroom and Photoshop CS6.
Cheers,
Wayne.

[ameerat42]

How about some (limited) experience from me, but maybe a lot more from others here on AP, or are you really hankering for those third party resources?
Am.

[I @ M]

Not my strong point Wayno but ----
Expose for the shadows ( raw of course ) without totally blowing highlights to lower the chance of noise in the darker areas even at low iso values.
Use Nik software silver efex pro plug in for CS or LR and learn how to use it.
Unfortunately that plug in doesn't work with my preferred editing program but all most of the results I have seen using it are impressive.

A bit of a video tute is at --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rnsc4fYLkGU

[Wayno]

Thanks guys.
Here's another vid on Nik Softaware Silver Efex.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ThY3jvT9AMQ

[Roosta]

Wayno, Digital photography Mag has a back issue on B & W and Mono.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f...type=1&theater

There is also the B & W edition, I have it at home, and found it very informative. You might be able to order it, the whole mags was on B & W shoot/settings and processing in PS.

Can also have a look at this.

I'll try to get the Mag issue number for Digital Photography - I just grab them from my local newsagent.

[Wayno]

Cheers for the heads up Roosta.
I fly back to Perth this Thursday so I'll run down to my local newsagency and see what mags they have to choose from. Failing that I'll back order something.

[mudman]

set your camera to b/w and then adjust to suit in pp

[Roosta]

Cheers for the heads up Roosta.
I fly back to Perth this Thursday so I'll run down to my local newsagency and see what mags they have to choose from. Failing that I'll back order something.

Wayne,

I just came across this link to a current mag. B & W write up.

http://www.australianphotography.com...-tips-and-more

[OzzieTraveller]

G'day mate

I suggest you trawl around your local junk shops for old photo mags showing Mono stuff & darkroom ideas
From these I suspect that you'll pick up ideas for digital processing

Phil

[nimrodisease]

Don't forget that the best way to learn is to practice!

[Jad]

The best way I have found to do B&W with digital is to set your cameras picture style to B&W. That way you will be able to evaluate your image in B&W on the LCD screen just after making the exposure in the field. You will need to make all of your exposures in RAW to get the full 16 bit information in your file. When you bring your image into camera RAW it will be in color and then you can start adjusting the overall exposure. The process of converting it to B&W is done in PS. The first step is to convert to B&W and adjust the sliders get a fairly balanced looking image. Then I start with setting the contrast for entire image using curves. The next step is to start dealing with the local contrast (two similar tones next to each other) in various parts of the image. To do this I make an adjustment layer with curves with a mask so I can paint in with the brush tool the contrast to a specific area of the image. I will usually have a number of these masked layers of local contrast adjustments. The next step is to do my dodging and burning of areas of the image that need to be lightened or darkened. The ending step is to give the image a slight selenium tone to give an overall cool tone to the final image. I have a blog site with some of my Black and White images that my be helpful for you to view.