enchong Posted June 10, 2007 Share #1 Posted June 10, 2007 Advertisement (gone after registration) Based on my one week use of the M8, I have surmised that the M8 is very good for B&W photos. This maybe because of the numerous problems this camera has for color photography such as the magenta etc. For those whose workflow and techinique for producing B&W photos is not a trade secret, and ahve been doing B&W from an M8 for a long time, may I request to know your workflow, settings and techniques in producing good B&W photos.... Thanks so much!! Enchong Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted June 10, 2007 Posted June 10, 2007 Hi enchong, Take a look here Black and White Photo. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
stunsworth Posted June 10, 2007 Share #2 Posted June 10, 2007 Simple, I shoot RAW and use the alien Skin Exposure plug in to convert to b&w :-) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
scott kirkpatrick Posted June 10, 2007 Share #3 Posted June 10, 2007 I don't do black and white routinely (Sean Reid and Walt Odets, who post frequently do, however), but I use the JFI profiles and C1 for a convenient workflow when I want that kind of output. I think the critical issue in going from color to b/w is that you need good separation of values in the midtones, so using a profile will often give clearer and stronger looking results than just setting r, g, and b values in a channel mixer. Among the JFI profiles, I like Tri-X, HP-5 and the yellow-filtered plain black and white ones (the yellow reduces noise in low light, high ISO shots). And there are others which I haven't experimented with enough. scott Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Hart Posted June 10, 2007 Share #4 Posted June 10, 2007 Shoot in RAW, then use Lightroom to convert to B&W, using the greyscale mixer to refine it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
norm_snyder Posted June 10, 2007 Share #5 Posted June 10, 2007 I shoot 95% black and white, and in fact, got the M8 for that purpose. The upside is that I have not had to be concerned with lens coding, etc. Shooting is done in B&W setting, DNG + jpeg. The jpegs are used for chimping, contact sheets, and the Raw conversion was done with Raw Developer, until the past two weeks, at which time I got an Intel Mac to replace my old machine, and upgraded to Photoshop CS3. The new version of Raw Developer [which I believe is the same as lightroom, from a conversion standpoint] is quite intuitive, and appears to be getting me good results. The interface is very good. Norm Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
andcolor Posted June 13, 2007 Share #6 Posted June 13, 2007 Based on my one week use of the M8, I have surmised that the M8 is very good for B&W photos. This maybe because of the numerous problems this camera has for color photography such as the magenta etc. For those whose workflow and techinique for producing B&W photos is not a trade secret, and ahve been doing B&W from an M8 for a long time, may I request to know your workflow, settings and techniques in producing good B&W photos.... Thanks so much!! Enchong Call me silly but - I love the BW as it is in Jpgs. I shoot at 640 and have it set as Option 3 on the camera. The light quality and lens/sensor sensitivity is magnificent. I like it a lot better than shooting RAW and converting. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bloomy20 Posted June 13, 2007 Share #7 Posted June 13, 2007 Advertisement (gone after registration) Scott, Regarding the JFI profiles, I downloaded them yesterday and seem to have some trouble getting to use them. Can you share with me how you get them located into the C1LE program. When i open up the profile section on C1 I can't locate them, even though I thought i had transported them across properly. do you recall how you did it. Your help would be much appreciated. I am using a mac by the way. Regards michael Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveEP Posted June 13, 2007 Share #8 Posted June 13, 2007 I shoot raw, then do the B&W conversion in Lightroom, with additional dodge & burn in Photoshop if/as required. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
pklein Posted June 13, 2007 Share #9 Posted June 13, 2007 Among the JFI profiles, I like Tri-X, HP-5 and the yellow-filtered plain black and white ones (the yellow reduces noise in low light, high ISO shots). And there are others which I haven't experimented with enough. Scott (or anyone else): I have the JFI standard B&W profiles with the various color filters. I haven't bought the profiles with film types. Do they also add noise/grain, or do they simply emulate the tonal rendition of each film? I looked at Sean Reid's extensive examples. The tonal differences between a couple of them were marked, the rest were very subtle. I have occasionally used the color-filter profiles, but for people shots, I find them too strong. I often use a yellow-green "filter" on B&W shots with both plants and people. JFI only has the straight colors, and even the weakest yellow often makes faces too pasty for me (then again, faces are probably often darker in Jerusalem for both ethnic and sunshine reasons, and Seattle has a lot of green leaves to lighten). Picture Window Pro has a very nice Transformation-Color-Monochrome routine where you can move the cursor about a color display and watch the results in a preview. For indoor work especially, I often use a "Tri-X" ratio that B.D. Colen kindly posted on the LUG a few years ago. The proportions in PWP are about Red 100, Green 76, Blue 58. Reduce proportionally for Photoshop so that R+G+B=100, if I recall correctly. The plain JFI profile is really, really, nice and I often just default to that when I know from the beginning that I want the photo in B&W. --Peter Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonoslack Posted June 13, 2007 Share #10 Posted June 13, 2007 Call me silly but - I love the BW as it is in Jpgs. I shoot at 640 and have it set as Option 3 on the camera. The light quality and lens/sensor sensitivity is magnificent. I like it a lot better than shooting RAW and converting. Call you silly? Certainly not, it's setting 3 on my camera as well. The jpgs are fine and it's so simple, I think it's great to have a fixed setting to work around. My only gripe is that i wish they wouldn't compress the jpgs quite as much. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sean_reid Posted June 14, 2007 Share #11 Posted June 14, 2007 Scott (or anyone else): I have the JFI standard B&W profiles with the various color filters. I haven't bought the profiles with film types. Do they also add noise/grain, or do they simply emulate the tonal rendition of each film? --Peter Hi Peter, The profiles don't add noise or grain. They just emulate each film's response to color (in the subject). Cheers, Sean Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Minos Posted June 14, 2007 Share #12 Posted June 14, 2007 I shoot b&w 95% of the time. This gives me the freedom not to worry about IR issues (even though I have the IR filter) or about white balance. I prefer to use jpeg, mostly because the capacity of the cards is much much bigger. And one must admit that the M8 is not the easiest of cameras to change cards or batteries with. (And I use a luigi case, which is nice, but makes it even harder.) This, even though the bottom plate concept is a nice touch of nostalgia. Besides, the jpegs do not really decrease image quality in a perceptible way. The advantages of post-shooting alterations with RAW don't really win in the balance with capacity. At least in my eyes. I shot RAW with my Nikon D200 in the past, and decided to step away from it after a while. I changed cameras, but stuck to the jpegs. On top of that, I use Apple Aperture, so jpeg makes sense. (Transfer and processing speeds are also shorter.) With the M8, I don't really modify the image much. Cropping, monochrome mixer. And sometimes (not really often), brightness and contrast. And that's just about it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
KevinA Posted June 14, 2007 Share #13 Posted June 14, 2007 Hi Peter, The profiles don't add noise or grain. They just emulate each film's response to color (in the subject). Cheers, Sean I am yet to see a digital B&W conversion that does not sacrifice highlight or shadow detail when the channels are tweaked to emulate a film, do these ones work better? Kevin. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leica Sp Posted June 14, 2007 Share #14 Posted June 14, 2007 Hi For nice B&W for me the best way: Capture one Pro develope in colour as16bit TIFF. Go in Photoshop and mix the channels to monochrome or use: - Alienskin Exposure (very nice with grain, very natural!) -- just try.. - Powerretouche Black & White Studio plugin - Digitalfilmtools 55mm (!) Grain in a picture for me it's very important -- looks better best regards Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest sirvine Posted June 14, 2007 Share #15 Posted June 14, 2007 It seems odd to me that people pay for these photoshop tools. There's almost nothing I've seen that can't be done as well or better with just photoshop itself. It's like paying someone to operate the sliders and menus for you. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
KevinA Posted June 14, 2007 Share #16 Posted June 14, 2007 HiFor nice B&W for me the best way: Capture one Pro develope in colour as16bit TIFF. Go in Photoshop and mix the channels to monochrome or use: - Alienskin Exposure (very nice with grain, very natural!) -- just try.. - Powerretouche Black & White Studio plugin - Digitalfilmtools 55mm (!) Grain in a picture for me it's very important -- looks better best regards That's the thing though those channel mixers always clip a highlight or lose detail. Even keeping it adding to 100. I've had success converting via numorous techniques but I still think it's at the expense of throwing information away, B&W film already has a greater range than digital to start with. Kevin. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leica Sp Posted June 14, 2007 Share #17 Posted June 14, 2007 i need Filters as a research to look it works or not, quality good enouth or not (there are many filter and plugins you better save the money)-- with knowhow you can do everything with Photoshop 2.0 too (...but maybe you need more time...) -- so better you buy the filters you agree and save time; it's better that way, then adobe buy the filters and implementade in the next version of Photoshop ---> so the program is coming bigger and bigger....meens slower and slower (see web- and video- interactive-functions in CS3..!) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leica Sp Posted June 14, 2007 Share #18 Posted June 14, 2007 That's the thing though those channel mixers always clip a highlight or lose detail.Even keeping it adding to 100. I've had success converting via numorous techniques but I still think it's at the expense of throwing information away, B&W film already has a greater range than digital to start with. Kevin. Hi Kevin me too i don't use the cannel mixer of photoshop... (bad contro about picturel!) better with third party developpers -- you get also the "selective color" mix-possibilities for fine tones.. best regards phil Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonoslack Posted June 14, 2007 Share #19 Posted June 14, 2007 Hi There I think that shooting black and white jpg is really in the spirit of the M series. I know that shooting raw and converting is a 'better' way of doing things, but it's fun and instructive to simply set it on black and white and go - rather like shooting film if you like. Today it was drab and raining - the light was already failing, but the dog still needed to go out - so I bunged on the 35 'cron, took a chance on getting the camera wet (which I did), and shot a bunch of black and white jpgs at 640 ISO. Not masterpieces, and you might prefer tri-x. I relish the fact that with maximum effort you can really get exactly what you want from the M8. But I Love the fact that you can just go out and bang away a few shots, and still get something to be satisfied with. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
norm_snyder Posted June 14, 2007 Share #20 Posted June 14, 2007 Jono-- If it's yours, it's not surprising that the owner of an original, Swedish, Saab would choose to do things a bit differently than the "accepted" way of doing things. Actually though, jpegs are a lot of fun--less leeway for error, and lots and lots of storage on a 2Gb card. --Norm Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! Link to post Share on other sites Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! ' data-webShareUrl='https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/26299-black-and-white-photo/?do=findComment&comment=281507'>More sharing options...
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