City & Land : Black & White

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Black & white photography, is a fairly new medium for me.  I knew I wanted to incorporate it into my workflow, but I didn’t know how.  I think shooting B&W has it’s place, and lately I have found some interesting ways to work with it. One of the tools I think is a must have for any photographer, is the ND filter. I swear by the B+W brand, and am addicted to the ND 10 stop filter.  During the day it’s an amazing tool, and 75% or more of the time I will convert these images to B&W.  If there are heavy clouds and moving elements, it will give you an incredible effect.

You can view my article on CurrentPhotographer.com called “Black Glass 101” to better understand this filter.

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Another tool I use to shoot B&W is my Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 prime lens.  I just feel free with this lens, and I almost always shoot handheld with it.  As a matter of fact I will set my ISO to auto from 100-6400, and let the camera choose the ISO to keep the shutter speed above 1/60th.  I will almost always shoot in Aperture Priority mode, and the only adjustments I have to make are my depth of field and exposure compensation settings.  I will usually stay with a wide aperture while shooting with this lens.

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When converting my images to B&W, I use Aperture 3’s black & white adjustment preset.  I also boost the red channel in the RGB section to 100%.  What usually happens is the exposure will need to be reduced, until the highlights aren’t clipping anymore.  If you boost the contrast a little and reduce the brightness a click or two you should have a well balanced high contrast B&W image.  Now you can fine tune the texture and definition, and also add sharpening and noise reduction if needed.  Sometimes I like to keep the grainy noise look in my B&W images.

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I think it helps when shooting B&W, to set your camera to monochrome.  This way you can review your images on the LCD screen in black & white.  You’ll also be able to better judge, if you need to reduce your exposure compensation by 1/3 or more to add more contrast.  Check your histogram, but make sure you like what you see on the screen. I hope that you will experiment with black and white photography and find my tips helpful.

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Comments

  1. Hi

    I am a big follower of Scott and his work – he has a very unique vision! I tried some Black and White with city scapes but usually with a 10mm lens and some unique angles. This one highlights a cornice decoration overlooking Rome.

    http://t.co/py7BI7W

    Regards, Erik
    Kerstenbeck Photographic Art

  2. Nice post Scott. You may want to look at Nik Silver Efex Pro. I can’t imagine doing B&W conversions without it. Love the ND filter look you are getting too. Nice work!