Anyone looking for colors that look good in BW?

[brambor]

Now that I am starting to use BW films I find that in some cases

items look better or worse depending on what their original color was

and how it is portrayed on a black and white film. For example on

Wednesday I developed my very first negative on which I test

photographed an orange jacket. The whole photograph looked worse than

I thought it would and I would attribute it to the color of the

jacket. That got to into thinking that when shooting BW I should

think differently than when doing color work where the colors and the

outcome on a picture are a bit more predictable.<div></div>

[al_kaplan1]

You're right, Rene. Back in ancient times, when we cut our teeth on B&W film, photography books and articles in the photography magazines were full information on the use of filters to control the way colors looked in the photograph. Outdoors it was considered normal to use a medium yellow filter to get proper tone rendition. A green filter was often used in men's prtraits to give a healthy tanned look to(caucasion) skin.

 

Complicating things now is the use of flourescent dyes in the cloth and "optical brighteners" in laundry detergents. Film doesn't always react to them the way we think it will. As you shoot more B&W you'll get a better feel for what your results will look like.

[lutz]

That's where digital P&Ss come in handy. For decades I had been longing for a high res B&W viewfinder for movie cameras. All that was available were brown Tiffen viewing glasses to give you a hint at what the contrast will most likely be - or personal experience. With the digicam's screens set to b&w mode you can get a fair idea nowadays what the greytone translation will look like. You can even test filters that way. <p>Remember that b&w filters will brighten colors of their own and darken their complementaries. In your case: an orange filter would have made the jacket look brighter and colors containing green darker.

[m_.]

Rene:

 

Agree with Al.

 

color and b&w are two different things and you should choose which media to use before hand, not after the shooting. I understand many people today think that digital is great because you can always shoot colors. if it doesn't work, then digitize into b&w. I always thought this is a wrong approach. photography has game elements in it but something can be well controlled. color or b&w happens to be one of them.

 

the photographer should decide what media to use for a certain shot before shooting the subject. this will require some training to "see" things either with colors or without colors.

[brambor]

It sure makes things more interesting. I bet it beats ice fishing in complexity...

[__jon__]

Hi Rene,

 

>Lutz Konermann Photo.net Patron, apr 23, 2004; 02:59 p.m.

All that was available were brown Tiffen viewing glasses to give you a hint at what the contrast will most likely be - or personal experience.

 

I have one of these viewers and use it occasionally. Calumet may still also make one. Ansel Adams' book 'The Negative' mentions the filter number, but I don't recall what it is. I got mine on ePay for about $15.<div></div>

[al_kaplan1]

(Putting on my other hat: Capt. Al Kaplan) I don't know about ice fishing, but fishing here in Florida gets pretty complex. Choosing which stage of the tide, wind and current directions, water temperature, sunny or cloudy all affect where to fish, which lure and which color, how deep and how fast or slow to fish it. Choosing a filter for B&W is much easier.

[brambor]

..putting on my fly fishing dunce cap... Fly fishing also a complex activity I enjoy very much but sitting in an ice shack waiting for the fish to bite is not my idea of challenge.

[terry_rory]

Greyscaled straight from colour neg image. (Portra 400 UC) Then scanned on Fuji Frontier to photo CD (as a jpg. file) Then greyscaled on Paint Shop Pro and resized for screen display.

 

"<a href="http://www.photo.net/photo/2149354">click here</a>"

[Troll]

I don't understand what the big deal is over choosing a filter. One just looks through the things and picks the one that gives the desired effect. After a little while it becomes almost automatic.

[Rob F.]

Not exactly, Bill, because the eye does not respond in the same way that B&W film does. Some films are more sensitive than the eye is to blue, for example, whereas the eye peaks in the yellow-green range. Viewing by eye through the filter can thus be misleading.

[working camera]

If you have been using colour and are new to conventional Black and White, it takes

some time to learn how to see in shades of grey, and then more time in learning how

to control tonalities. The old pre-visualisation technique, as most famously advocated

by AA, IMHO is essential for avoiding little surprises. When I took up photography I

started with B+W and learned colour later, so I�ve never needed the viewing filters,

but I see how they could be a useful aid.

 

Personally I find it difficult to automatically switch between colour and B+W while

working. I�m either in colour mode or black and white. Using colour stock and

converting it to B+W is PS makes no sense to me. But I�m a pedant and an old luddite.

 

Craig

[dan flanders]

Well Al, My daddy used to say that the best time to fish was when you were near the water � but only then when standing or sitting � never while lying down!

[brambor]

Your daddy was a big fan of the universal truth.