Ok, so I'm rather a newbie at taking more than snapshots and I would like some advice. I see alot of you taking B&W photographs especially of people and marvel at the smooth B&W surfaces and tones that you are able to achieve with minimal noise and yet sharp definition? Alot of these are indoors with limited light. How does one do this without significant postprocessing? My successes have been hit and miss. Would appreciate some guidance. Thank you all.
Maybe you could post a couple here to give some idea of the type of shot you're after. It's possibly to do with the f stop used or the type of lens. If you take a look to the side of the shots most of the time the exif information is provided that gives some idea of how the photographer achieved their shot. HTH
@jaybutterfield Post processing is needed on most of these shots Jay. IMO. Someone who does this "soft" B&W effect well is @northy, and I'm sure she can add some words of wisdom.
Also SOOC B&W shooters, look for Richard Sayer @vignouse and Jasper @jasperc with their FujiFilm digital cameras. For a film shooter with a high end specialized camera Peter de Graaf @peterdegraaf. I am sure they can provide insights too.
In low light at high ISO with a digital camera hand held? Noise mitigation, noise mitigation. I find "digital noise reduction" options in the camera (I've tried many Nikons, some Sonys and the Canon 7DII and 6D) ineffective, so it's the editor i always rely on if the camera injects noise i want to get rid of. Lightroom/CameraRaw-Photoshop or DxO Optics Pro are just a few suggestions which I have tried. I stick with PS/ACR. And then since noise mitigation can remove detail - DxO interestingly say they don't "blur" it away as others do - sharpen it up again. And if you need to soften it a little after that yet keep the sharpening apparent, a 10% layer of Gaussian Blur.
And while in the editor with the raw (color) file out of the camera, you might want to experiment with changes from the "Standard" "grayscale mapping" - which colors turn out light or dark and by how much. Can you do some of this "mapping" in the camera? A little, but you have to start editing the "picture controls" for B&W, and then typically you will only have a resulting jpeg out of the camera.
If you don't want to do the conversions from color to B&W from scratch, there are numerous "plugins" to the chief editors that have many cool presets. Nik Silver Efex is often mentioned, but the DxO Film Packs are also interesting with a number of "specialty" effects to render the effects of famous classic film brands.
Does it seem like "cheating?" Well, all the old masters, Adams and the Westons are the classic examples I always seem to reference, dodged and burned and manipulated the prints in the analog darkroom. A lot. It was so much harder then though.
A great B&W comprehensive reference, historical and the most modern techniques, is "The Complete Guide to Black & White Digital Photography" by Michael Freeman. You might also want to follow along the February theme http://365project.org/discuss/themes-competitions/27112/flash-of-red-february-returns which is B&W despite the "red" in the title.
@jaybutterfield A quick response on the back of @frankhymus useful comments: both @jasperc and I are doing an OCOLOY project (One Camera, One [prime] Lens for One Year) and adding a little extra piquancy by choosing to do it SOOC and in B&W. I've not discussed this with Jasper but I would imagine that both of us have chosen the same camera for this challenge, for the same good reasons.
The Fuji X100 (the T model in my case) produces excellent quality JPEGs, especially in B&W and one can control some of the shooting parameters in camera. All the principal adjustments (shutter speed, aperture, ISO and exposure compensation) either have their own dedicated controls or can be programmed to have them, so they can be adjusted with the camera at the eye. The camera is mirror-less, so in the B&W mode the image in the viewfinder is B&W and WYSIWYG - any change in shooting parameters will be immediately transferred to the viewfinder image. All of this does make in-camera B&W easier to do well - and after a while it becomes instinctive... which is the point of the exercise. Try putting your Canon 60D into B&W mode (you will need to be shooting in JPEG or JPEG + Raw) and use Liveview instead of the viewfinder. Good luck - (perfect) practice makes perfect!
@psychographer@frankhymus@vignouse Thank you all for your helpful comments. I see your B&Ws and others here and will definitely experiment with the exposure information provided and the external reference material. I am shooting with a Canon 60D primarily with 50mm (prime) f/1.8 although sometimes I use the 24-135mm f/3.5 zoom.
Richard, I am inspired by your SOOC and OCOLOY discipline. Thanks all!
Jay - i'm not sure if you're looking at my shots as i haven't done many people shots of late... but i am always happy to try to explain how i achieved an effect with processing...
@jaybutterfield@vignouse As Richard suggests, with a DSLR shooting in Live View, you can see the Black and White, and that is a great discipline. You will have less than the best AF performance compared with a "through the optical viewfinder" system, all DSLRs do, none matching even mid-range modern mirror-less systems' main sensor-based abilities. But maybe you can get some Manual Focus practice in. :)
@jaybutterfield Hi Jay. I'm also doing the OCOLOY but a few days ago lifted the SOOC constraint from my project. You received a lot of good info, I would like to throw one thing out there I didn't see come up. One of the easiest ways to get a "soft" tones in an image (b&w or color) is to significantly reduce contrast (usually in post).
@jaybutterfield Jay, I've been through your shots. You have made some really nice images already and got some good advice on this string. You'll get a lot out of your 50mm 1.8f. It'll be great for portraits, amongst other things. Use it wide open for a shallow depth of field and enjoy the way you can blur background and foreground.
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Also SOOC B&W shooters, look for Richard Sayer @vignouse and Jasper @jasperc with their FujiFilm digital cameras. For a film shooter with a high end specialized camera Peter de Graaf @peterdegraaf. I am sure they can provide insights too.
In low light at high ISO with a digital camera hand held? Noise mitigation, noise mitigation. I find "digital noise reduction" options in the camera (I've tried many Nikons, some Sonys and the Canon 7DII and 6D) ineffective, so it's the editor i always rely on if the camera injects noise i want to get rid of. Lightroom/CameraRaw-Photoshop or DxO Optics Pro are just a few suggestions which I have tried. I stick with PS/ACR. And then since noise mitigation can remove detail - DxO interestingly say they don't "blur" it away as others do - sharpen it up again. And if you need to soften it a little after that yet keep the sharpening apparent, a 10% layer of Gaussian Blur.
And while in the editor with the raw (color) file out of the camera, you might want to experiment with changes from the "Standard" "grayscale mapping" - which colors turn out light or dark and by how much. Can you do some of this "mapping" in the camera? A little, but you have to start editing the "picture controls" for B&W, and then typically you will only have a resulting jpeg out of the camera.
If you don't want to do the conversions from color to B&W from scratch, there are numerous "plugins" to the chief editors that have many cool presets. Nik Silver Efex is often mentioned, but the DxO Film Packs are also interesting with a number of "specialty" effects to render the effects of famous classic film brands.
Does it seem like "cheating?" Well, all the old masters, Adams and the Westons are the classic examples I always seem to reference, dodged and burned and manipulated the prints in the analog darkroom. A lot. It was so much harder then though.
Leica just announced a "true" B&W digital camera, the Typ 246 Monochrom. For US$7,400! If you look at the Sample Gallery though you will see that many (most?) of the images have been "edited to taste" in Camera Raw. So if a $7,000 camera needs the help of an editor...
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/3204143829/246-shades-of-grey-leica-m-monochrom-typ-246-real-world-and-studio-samples
A great B&W comprehensive reference, historical and the most modern techniques, is "The Complete Guide to Black & White Digital Photography" by Michael Freeman. You might also want to follow along the February theme http://365project.org/discuss/themes-competitions/27112/flash-of-red-february-returns which is B&W despite the "red" in the title.
The Fuji X100 (the T model in my case) produces excellent quality JPEGs, especially in B&W and one can control some of the shooting parameters in camera. All the principal adjustments (shutter speed, aperture, ISO and exposure compensation) either have their own dedicated controls or can be programmed to have them, so they can be adjusted with the camera at the eye. The camera is mirror-less, so in the B&W mode the image in the viewfinder is B&W and WYSIWYG - any change in shooting parameters will be immediately transferred to the viewfinder image. All of this does make in-camera B&W easier to do well - and after a while it becomes instinctive... which is the point of the exercise. Try putting your Canon 60D into B&W mode (you will need to be shooting in JPEG or JPEG + Raw) and use Liveview instead of the viewfinder. Good luck - (perfect) practice makes perfect!
Richard, I am inspired by your SOOC and OCOLOY discipline. Thanks all!
Jay - i'm not sure if you're looking at my shots as i haven't done many people shots of late... but i am always happy to try to explain how i achieved an effect with processing...
All the best with your B&W efforts.