rodolfo_negrete Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 I know that this has been already asked but I was wonderiing anyone liked to share a best way to convert a color digital picture to Black and White . I have realized that to acomplish this there are alot of ways .but i was wondering if someone had already found a way that provided results just as good or better than the traditional Black and white. this website provides some very good samples of a quality conversionwhich I wish I was able to acomplish and for this matter I think alot of us.not just me.http://www.elenarosenberg.com/organic%20matter/organicmatter.html thank you for sharing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ellis_vener_photography Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Try Photokit from www.pixelgenius.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kymtman Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 PhotoShop! [image, mode, grayscale] its that easy and they print wonderful on a good printer. also if you want to lab print them you have two actions: 1. Send out for them 2. Print a digital negative the size ya want and contact print them to real photo paper and develop. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EricM Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 That PixelGenius was a major disappointment Ellis. Try The Image Factory, Convert To Black and White Pro, I really like it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ellis_vener_photography Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Eric, I'll check that out! I haven't been dissatisfied with the PhotoKit tool set. my experience is that it does a better job than other conversion tools I've seen. What was the source of your disappointment with PhotoKit? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spearhead Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Eric's recommendation is good, the tool is excellent if a bit on the expensive side. It has a lot of control that mimics film work, which is nice.<p> <center><img src="http://www.spirer.com/images/girlandguy.jpg"><br><i>Moment of Reckoning, Copyright 2004</i></center></center><p> I tend to like things a bit more contrasty, the multigrade slider is excellent for that. Music and Portraits Blog: Life in Portugal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moore_photography Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 I'm also a fan of Convert to B&W pro 2.0.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dumpster001 Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 what's wrong with the good ol' channel mixer? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spearhead Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Black and White Pro has controls similar to working in the film world. There are film profiles (and you can build custom profiles) to approximate the response to specific films, you can apply filters in a continuous variety of colors, you can specify negative exposure, print exposure and paper grade. These are very useful if you've done any traditional work. Music and Portraits Blog: Life in Portugal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scott_eaton Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Sorry, but I have yet to see any of these plug-ins do much more than what can be done with channel mixer, a layer with added noise, and a good eye. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rodolfo_negrete Posted June 21, 2004 Author Share Posted June 21, 2004 the channel mixer might be a good way to do this but I wonder who has the best .aslong as you came out with a good Black and white picture does not matter if you use a plugging or do it manually. I think we all want the best possible way to get a quality Black and white picture not just an ok one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jerry_diakiw Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 I have tried everything from grayscale, to desaturate to programs such as photokit , imagefactory, fredmiranda as well as several others. Imagte factrory is by far the best tool with the most sophisticated controls and very user friendly but very very expensive. The best value is fredmiranda's newest black and white conversion with many controls and tweaking options, including a grain controllerJerry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beauh44 Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 Hi Rodolfo, I usually use Channel Mixer, but last night I stumbled on a method by accident, made a print of it, and it turned out really well. Your mileage may vary, and it may have been a fluke on my part, but I've never seen this technique described before. 1) Pull up the channel palette and go to the green channel. (you can try other colors; I had good results with green - the image was a portrait) 2) Select All (Ctrl-A) and copy it to the clipboard (Ctrl-C) 3) Return to the layers palette and create a new, empty layer (Ctrl-Shift-N) 4) Paste the green channel into the empty layer (Ctrl-V) At his point, it's not impressive - you're just looking at a copy of the green channel... 5) Set the blend mode of the green channel to "Color". It really smooths things out. That's it. Give it shot - as I said, mine turned out really well! (If you want to keep things in color but give it a little punch, set the blend mode to "Soft light") Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mark__5 Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 "I think we all want the best possible way to get a quality Black and white picture not just an ok one." that would involve pulling out the bw film and forgetting color conversions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spearhead Posted June 23, 2004 Share Posted June 23, 2004 I think it's clear that sentence was about a color original. If it isn't, I'll add some text to the original question to make it obvious. Music and Portraits Blog: Life in Portugal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mark__5 Posted June 23, 2004 Share Posted June 23, 2004 I know it was about a color original, which makes the whole effort sorta pointless since you compromise the image from the very start. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amy_rothstein Posted June 24, 2004 Share Posted June 24, 2004 My favorite comes from a page that has several techniques. (site link below) My favorite: 2 Hue/Saturation Adjustment layers Go to Layer - New Adjustment layer - Hue/Saturation. Then just click OK without altering any of the settings - and then change the layer mode from Normal to Color. Then add another new Hue/Saturation Adjustment layer - but this time turn down the Saturation to -100 before you click OK. Double click the first Hue/Saturation Adjustment layer you made (the color mode one) and then adjust the effect on the picture by sliding the Hue bar until you get an effect you're satisfied with. You can also then adjust the saturation bar to even adjust some more. Add a mask to the lower hue/saturation layer, and you've got a very flexible way to adjust the grays in a converted image. Add a mask to the upper one and you've got a partially desaturated image. The above technique paraphrased from this page, which has images illustrating each step: http://www.eyesondesign.net/pshop/bw/converting_to_bw.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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