Black and White photos

[ChrisBlaze]

Whats makes a good black and white photo?

[SkipD]

A good B&W photo has essentially the same qualities as any good photo, but substituting well-defined shades of gray (contrast control) instead of colors to define the subject material.

[braduardo]

A good B&W photo has essentially the same qualities as any good photo, but substituting well-defined shades of gray (contrast control) instead of colors to define the subject material.

Or by minimizing the amount of gray and being very high-contrast...

In a good b&w photo, often times you can just kinda 'feel' the colors even though you can't see them. You just 'know' that a dress is red, or a truck is blue. I don't really know how to describe it. B&W has it's own feel, but the fundamentals stay the same as far as content/composition/etc.

[ChrisBlaze]

could someone post an example?

[rammy]

could someone post an example?

How about the one in this thread (http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=318951)? Some steps further below the thread on the conversion process.

I agree with SkipD that the range of tones matters a lot. Flat colours with no range don't seem to come out that well in B&W.

[airfrogusmc]

The best way is to look at the great B&W photographers work. Some images need high contrast some need as much tonal range as possible.
Weston
http://etsilabeaute.hautetfort.com/images/medium_weston01.jpg

http://www.afterimagegallery.com/Pepperl.jpg

http://www.daytonartinstitute.org/images/collection/WestonShell.jpg

Stieglitz
http://www.photoman.co.kr/photo/photographer/stieglitz-TheSteerage.JPG

http://www.thismoment.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/blog/hands_es.jpg
Adams
http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en-commons/thumb/3/37/300px-Adams_The_Tetons_and_the_Snake_River.jpg

http://www.andrewsmithgallery.com/images/misc/ansel_adams.jpg

http://www.bigredandshiny.com/issues/issue26/pix/review/VERONICA_ANSEL_ADAMS_71698_03.jpg

[Mcary]

Whats makes a good black and white photo?

People make for excellent black and white photo's Anything from a beautiful model to a rugged iron work or the weather feature of old man can make for a wonderful B&W photo.

Mike

[airfrogusmc]

Anyone really serious about B&W should be looking into film. 4X5 or even 2 1/4 negs and silver gelatin or platinum prints are far superior to digital and ink jet.

[suecassidy]

If I remember correctly from my photo school days, one theory of B&W is the zone theory that says that it encompasses 11 zones or shades, made up of everything from the whitest, crispest whites, to the grays, to middle gray and so on until the 11th shade which is the inkiest, darkest black and everything in between. A lot of B&W if you really look at it, doesn't really have good blacks or crisp whites. The whites are muddy and the blacks not really very black. The highest standards of B&W were in my opinion produced by Ansel Adams and if you study a good quality litho of his work, you will understand the difference between good b&w and not. He had a special way of processing his stuff to achieve that luminous effect. It is also my understanding that airFrog is absolutely correct in saying that digital photography and most printing methods used can't easily achieve quality like that. Not yet anyway.

[DrPablo]

Ansel Adams is but one of many crowning examples of B&W photography -- what he should be best remembered for is his meticulous composition, and his masterful exploitation of panchromatic films. The zone system was more of an organizational tool than anything else. But there are many other photographers through history that I think match (or exceed) Adams as exemplars of B&W. Edward Weston comes immediately to mind, but you can go as far back as Timothy O'Sullivan in the 1860s with his orthochromatic glass plates to find magnificent B&W photography.

I don't think a great B&W photo has to have a high contrast range overall -- there can certainly be subtlety. But the name of the game is control of tone placement. If you want to take a picture of a tree in the fog, then you'll want a certain shade of gray for the fog and a darker one for the tree -- but not necessarily pure black.

And film is still the king of B&W, especially in LF, but these days I think the problem with digital B&W isn't so much the printing anymore. I think it's mainly that people pay too little attention to soft tonal gradients, too little attention to highlight and shadow detail, too little attention to tone curves, and too much attention to imitating Ansel Adams. Throw in all the errors people make post-processing (like oversharpening) and you end up having images that just don't cut it. Of course there are a million ways to screw up film as well -- trust me, I've done them all.

[Tony-S]

but these days I think the problem with digital B&W isn't so much the printing anymore.

I disagree with this. The only printers that can do excellent B&W cost more than US$400. Even my i9900 has issues; green or magenta hue on some papers (such as linen). The only way around it is to print in grayscale (to shut off the color inks), but then you lose tonal range because it only has a single black ink tank. What I'd like to see is a sub-$300 printer that comes with 3 black cartridges and 10- or 12-bit grayscale. Until then, B&W for consumers is going to suffer.

[DrPablo]

I wasn't arguing for their availability. They DO exist, but for most of us it entails sending away for a professional print. I completely agree that consumer printers aren't remotely up to the task.

But traditional the black and white silver print (not to mention platinum / palladium prints, kallitypes, etc) present a very difficult standard to achieve. I'm not sure they'll ever make their way to $200 desktop photo printers, but I think the high end equipment has made great strides.

[Tony-S]

I wasn't arguing for their availability. They DO exist, but for most of us it entails sending away for a professional print. I completely agree that consumer printers aren't remotely up to the task.

But traditional the black and white silver print (not to mention platinum / palladium prints, kallitypes, etc) present a very difficult standard to achieve.

OK, I see what you mean now. Thanks for the clarification.

I'm not sure they'll ever make their way to $200 desktop photo printers, but I think the high end equipment has made great strides.

I don't know why they can't. I mean, they already make $50 printers with 4 ink tanks (black and three colors). Why can't they make a dedicated 3- or 4-ink B&W printer that does not do color? It seems that it would only require software revision of the printers they're already using. Instead of putting in the 4 standard color ink tanks, put in a photo-black, flat-black and two gray shades, then all they'd need is an updated ROM or flash memory in the printer and that'd be it.

And why can't they do 10-bit imaging? Is there something about nozzle technology that prevents it? It can't be the microprocessors - 16-bit chips have been around since the 1980s. If I could find a $200 B&W-only printer that could do 10-bit grayscale, I'd be the first in line to buy it.

[Doug Pardee]

Why can't they make a dedicated 3- or 4-ink B&W printer that does not do color?

I've heard good things about the Epson Stylus C88 (http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/consumer/consDetail.jsp?BV_UseBVCookie=yes&oid=58654751) (currently being closed out at $80 US) when used with MIS grayscale inks (http://www.inksupply.com/utez.cfm) ($55 US for a full set of cartridges for both matte and glossy, or $110 for both neutral and warm sets). MIS also has continuous-inking and bulk ink.

Haven't tried it myself, just reporting what I've heard.

[DrPablo]

You need demand for them to bring a dedicated printer like that to market. I doubt many people would demand a dedicated B&W printer for home.

If there were a modular one in which you could swap out the four color inks for four grayscale inks then that might be a possibility.

[airfrogusmc]

Its the metals silver/platinum and even silver nitrate in the so called non silver process that give the mojo to those wonderful B&W prints. Ink and paper just can't reflect light back to your eye the same way. Knowing when to use more contrast or less is the key to really good B&W images. I remember reading something where Adams was talking about Weston and said that Edward denied knowing the zone system and Adams corrected him by saying "you know it, its in every one of your photographs you just haven't articulated it except in the print itself." or something like that.

[DrPablo]

Its the metals silver/platinum and even silver nitrate in the so called non silver process that give the mojo to those wonderful B&W prints. Ink and paper just can't reflect light back to your eye the same way.

Absolutely. Glossy paper doesn't either -- and this is true for RA4 color printing as well. The only time glossy papers look good is when you really need a huge contrast range on the print itself, because of the increased reflectivity. It's almost like apples and oranges to talk about handcoated processes like platinum/palladium, vandyke, cyanotype, etc. Because in those cases you're dealing with a handmade emulsion, and everything from paper texture to the brush or coating rod you use becomes part of the aesthetic.

What can't be argued, though, is that some of the alternative handcoated processes have a truly mind-blowing dynamic range (or more precisely contrast range).

This is a 4x5 argyrotype of mine (silver nitrate and potassium ferricyanide based -- closely related to vandyke printing but with more silver) that presented no problems at all with this process -- but I've had extreme difficulty printing using normal silver printing. If I use low contrast grades the print looks muddy, and if I use higher contrast grades I get no detail in the altar or windows. I've had to do extensive burning under the enlarger to get the altar to have detail. But on argyrotype, and I'm sure on Pt/Pd it is completely within the medium's range.

http://www.pbase.com/drpablo74/image/79290724.jpg

[airfrogusmc]

Looks great on the computer screen I can only imagine the actual print. Very nice image. I did some cyanotypes and a few van dyke browns a few years back. Contact 4X5 prints and in the sun for a few minutes. Took a while to hit the right exposure but when you get it right WHOA...

I found some of my old notes from when I tested a 4X5 Deardorf with a 90mm lens. If you are interested I could post the density readings finding my asa and normal development times and film curve for tri x 320 in D 76 1:1?

[ChrisBlaze]

so I have a friend that is interested in doing B&W portraits, is there a rule when dealing with location and clothing attire?

[DAMphyne]

A $500 printer is way less expensive than a darkroom.
Not including time.

[airfrogusmc]

Yeah but put in the time. Nothing in the digital world comes close to a beautiful properly exposed 4X5 negative and a silver gelatin print.

[DAMphyne]

Can't argue against that.
Ohh, for the good old days.

[Tony-S]

so I have a friend that is interested in doing B&W portraits, is there a rule when dealing with location and clothing attire?

Lots of right ways to do it. In the old days we'd use a green filter on the camera for good skin tones, but now days it's done in post processing. PSCS3 has green filtration built in, as does DPP, I think.

[Tony-S]

Yeah but put in the time. Nothing in the digital world comes close to a beautiful properly exposed 4X5 negative and a silver gelatin print.

Now, if we can only get those 4x5 digital backs (http://www.betterlight.com/super10K_PR.html) a down in price a bit...

[ChrisBlaze]

Lots of right ways to do it. In the old days we'd use a green filter on the camera for good skin tones, but now days it's done in post processing. PSCS3 has green filtration built in, as does DPP, I think.

I was looking for things like the color she should wear and type of location that really brings out B&W?

[PhotosGuy]

Ohh, for the good old days. :p I've got a 7' Durst enlarger in my basement that I haven't touched in years & I don't miss using it at all. Do I miss HQ B&W prints? Just a bit, but now color is as cheap, or cheaper than B&W from a pro lab, & most people want that instead, which is what drives what I shoot.

Do I thing B&W is dead? No, & I don't think it ever will be. Schools & the fine art people will always find a place for it.
Would I shoot B&W if a client needed it? Of course, but otherwise I don't have a problem ignoring that 0.01% of the market. ;)
I was looking for things like the color she should wear and type of location that really brings out B&W? Unless you do it all the time, it's difficult to "see" the interaction of subject & background tones when color becomes B&W. Some people used a very deep green filter to view the set. Maybe you could take a laptop & use an Action to quick-convert to see what you're getting.

As to your reasons for shooting her in the 1st place:
Post #4: http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showpost.php?p=861612&postcount=4