B&W conversions

Hi all,

Posted over on the Still Life, B/W & Experimental forum but not much response. I'm looking for critique on the following 4 images in particular the black and white conversations.

Kindest regards,

Stark

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last 2....

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Excellent! I like the level of contrast and overall tonality. Good job!

Thanks Rich.

i'm starting to get into B&W myself...I think your 2nd and 3rd image are fanatstic.
the last one is too contrasty for my taste but that's my own personal taste. Number one is not bad but it's a tough shot to make work , I've had many like that myself where the sillhouttes get intertwined where you can't tell them apart.

Overall they are great shots.

Thanks Bronco

I'll tell you what I think if you tell me how you did it.
I like them a lot, wish I could do B&W conversions. Everytime I've tried it looks horrible.
I've even tried a bunch of the B&W conversion actions and I still don't like my results.

I am also struggling with B&W conversions, and I would appreciate any tips. These are very good, IMO.

I like #2 and #3 above. The contrast is good. There is a good range of tones from black to white. You can see the detail.

For #1, I just have a bias that sunsets work best in color. Call me unimaginative, but that is my preference.

shooterman wrote in post #4190612
I'll tell you what I think if you tell me how you did it.
I like them a lot, wish I could do B&W conversions. Everytime I've tried it looks horrible.
I've even tried a bunch of the B&W conversion actions and I still don't like my results.

From my own experience, good or near perfect exposure is good for B&W, the light and the whites of the picture have to be caught well..

Then the two most important elements are contrast and some cases sharpness.

Broncobear wrote in post #4192395
From my own experience, good or near perfect exposure is good for B&W, the light and the whites of the picture have to be caught well..

Then the two most important elements are contrast and some cases sharpness.

OK, so why do my conversions disappoint me then?

im not really a fan on the first one maybe because of the low res is some how making it less appealing and feels a little heavy on the bottom with how the clouds on top are also kinda in the same spectrum of grayness. I would crop it to the the beginning of the second break in the clouds(if that makes sense basically half way down from the top.) i like the others ones good tonal value very nice overall.

shooterman wrote in post #4190612
I'll tell you what I think if you tell me how you did it.
I like them a lot, wish I could do B&W conversions. Everytime I've tried it looks horrible.
I've even tried a bunch of the B&W conversion actions and I still don't like my results.

Levels, adjusted the individual RGB channels.
Channel Mixer, mono and an adjustment to the channels after.
Vignetting using filter, distort, lens correction
USM

and thats about it. The way I'm trying to manage my work flow is that if it takes anymore than 10 min to process I should have taken a better picture!!

regards,

Nick

thanks for all your other comments

love 2 and 4!

shooterman wrote in post #4192803
OK, so why do my conversions disappoint me then?

Best thing to do is to put up some in the critique forum with info of exif plus your pp and ask people for comments...you'll get a lot out of the advice with differen't styles for ideas.

I keep my B&W pretty simple , I generally know before the shot if I'm goign to lean doing it it B&W or leaving it in colour so I'll try to expose it accordingly.

here are a few examples from my collection.