Black and White Digital Photography

Black and white digital photography is a lot of fun. You can take lovely photos and convert them to black and white to give them a completely different look. You can even use black and white adjustments to save a photo that you may have initially thought was no good.

In my first article about digital black and white photography, we discussed the benefits of shooting your pictures in color and converting them to black and white in post production. In case you didn't read that article I'll just shortly review by saying that when you take pictures in black and white your camera is doing the conversion process. This gives you less creative control over the look of the picture. When you wait until afterward to adjust the picture to black and white in your digital imaging software you can adjust aspects of the color and contrast to get the image you want.

If you're shooting in RAW, which I recommend, it doesn't matter if you set your camera to black and white mode to take pictures. As a matter of fact go ahead and set it black and white mode if you're shooting in RAW. If you do you'll be able to preview the black and white imagines on the LCD screen to get an idea of what the picture looks like in black and white, but when you put the pictures on your computer they'll be in color. RAW files are always in color until you convert them. Saving the original RAW color image will give you more choices when working with a picture.

Here's a color picture I took in London the other day that I don't think is very good. Let's use this picture to look at ways we can convert color pictures into black and white digital photography.

When you convert your photograph you can use the greyscale tool in your imaging software to do the conversion. When you do you can adjust channels to affect the contrast and tone of the photograph.

These days I've been using Paint.net to edit my pictures. I usually use my RAW converter software to do some minor tweaks. Then I upload the saved jpeg into Paint.net to do further adjusting. This system has been working out well for me.

Most image editing software has some kind of greyscale mixer. I recommend that you experiment with it to see what types of results you can get. Here's an example of how the picture I showed you earlier looks when converted to black and white digital photography and then mixed in greyscale mode.

In the last panel of this picture I used desaturation as my method of turning the picture into black and white. That just means I pulled the color saturation down until the image was black and white. This method sometimes makes better black and white pictures than other methods.

As I always say experimentation is key. Play with your software and see what kind of results you get. It's only through practice that you'll master black and white digital photography.

Related Articles

Digital Black and White Photography--Here are some composition tips for black and white photography.

RAW Format Files--Find out why you should be shooting in the RAW.

The Best Digital Photography Software--Find out which digital photography software on the market today is the best.

Free Photo Editing Software--Find out about free software you can download online.