Photography Thailand Forum

[mahonyWeb]

I've never been happy with my B&W conversions, which I always felt were a bit murky instead of clean and crisp.

So today I have a play with Photoshop, and resulted in this:



Original (underexposed) colour version:




Hope you like :)

[agitlits]

I think the B&W conversion you achieved is nice and contrasty. However, I feel that for this particular subject colour is more suitable as I love to see the  colour contrast between gold and sky, etc. What lens did you use  - was it around 10-12 mm ?

Cheers
Alex

[mahonyWeb]

I used a Canon 17-40 L on a full frame Canon 5D :)

Soft at the edges, and vignetting to boot, but about as good a wide lens as you're going to get made by Canon. I tried a couple of 16-35s, but was not impressed. To be honest, the 5D really tears the 17-40 apart.

Quoted elsewhere on the web:

Full-frame, high resolution sensor is very demanding of lenses, even high-end lenses can have trouble in the corners (Plan on spending serious $$ on lenses to keep up with this body!)

Also see: http://www.16-9.net/ultrawides/ :)

[Renato]

I saw this photo in your flickr photostream but the B/W you posted here is much better and more detailed. I am also trying to learn on B/W photography but so far I still have not been able to come up with something worth posting anywhere.

[fred]

Your temple scene may not be suitable for B&W.
 
Ansel Adams said once his success with B&W began with the fact he only shot B&W scenes with B&W detail and B&W lighting - that gave him a headstart in darkroom. Adams was working too with a B&W dedicated camera and B&W specialty film. Plus he had a wealth of experience waving a hand under enlarger to obtain desired effects.
I cite Adams because he established examples used for comparison that for whatever reasons are difficult to duplicate with digital.
 
My experience with B&W indicates uncomplicated scenes are simplest both in darkroom and with computer. It also revealed it takes a lot of doing to get it right - that I haven't mastered yet.
 
A tip to maybe reduce parallax if you want to. Screw an accessory wide angle on standard zoom lens. That's been known to fool a camera and somewhere in zoom range the scene will stand upright.
 
Keep plugging at B&W and tell Forum what you discover. I'd like to learn more.

[mahonyWeb]

Your temple scene may not be suitable for B&W.
 

Do you mind me asking why you think it may not be suitable?

I've gone for a high contrast look on purpose as I thought the image suited it.

I'm not ashamed to admit, I doubt I'll ever be an Ansel Adams 

[gregoire]

Because the temple was not in black and white in real life. Ansel Adams took pictures a long time ago, when the world was in black in white. Oh boy, those were the days. When it turned to colors, he took a few muddled ektachromes, couldn't bear it, and passed away. God rest his soul.

[fred]

Your temple photo captured in color, displays much detail across the page. My knee jerk comment "unsuitable" was initial reaction because I couldn't conceive an easy way to convert it to B&W. B&W responds better to simplicity.
 
Color conversions come with a built in natural factor that cannot be avoided. Color distinguishes detail with shades of color, whereas B&W distinguishes detail with shades of gray between pure black and pure white. Removing one color leaves a shade of gray that often is not distinguishable from another color's shade of gray when neither has a visibly unique achromatic gray. My experience sees this condition most pronounced in conversions.
On the other hand, a camera created B&W photo will capture gray contrasts much better. But that doesn't help much if you can't shoot original B&W.
 
At one time I was involved with B&W illustrated manuals. Color photos were used occasionally, but I recall the photo lab played hell processing them to same quality as B&W negatives. That's when I learned about "achromatic". It appears to apply equally to both film and digital.
 
I mentioned Ansel Adams because he was a B&W guru. It's worth a study of his simplicity. Another is David Bailey who works with color also. Bailey is still alive. You might want to read up on "achromatic" too.
 
Keep Forum informed of your progress. There's a bunch of us "experts" that can use the information.

[mahonyWeb]

Thanks for your frank assessment :)

Here are a couple more, which I personally do not like as much:





and a colour, which looks wonky, but isn't:



:)