Black and White Photography Tips
Even though color pictures are the norm, for an avid photographer it is important to know about black and white digital photography as well.
Besides, once in a while it feels good to see pictures in black and white. It takes you back in time when things seemed to be so relaxed and you can spot that in the pictures too.
Tips for Black And White Digital Photography
Almost all the digital cameras nowadays have the functions to help you click black n white pictures.
But what if your camera doesn’t have those features? Don’t worry! There are other ways to get that end result.
Here are some tips, more of guidelines you can say, and not rules (you may have good reasons to do otherwise).
1. Shoot in RAW
Also make sure that you shoot in RAW than any other format, if you want to have more control when editing on the computer. It also captures your color data in case you need it later.
Why not JPEG? You can shoot in JPEG, no problem with that, but jpeg compresses and discards some data so you will not have lot of control in post production.
2. Study Black And White Pictures
Check out some good pictures in black and white to see the details, to study the composition and get an idea of how lighting is used.
3. Use Rich Textures
To make your pictures livelier, use patterns, textures and detailed scenes when shooting the pictures.
4. Use of Contrast
Overcast conditions are suitable for shoot black white outdoor shots (a bit subjective as some may prefer the glow that is available on brighter days)
But since you don’t have color, experimenting with side lighting can provide you with shadows to help you get contrast. This will help to bring the tonal differences in your photos.
5. Use a Polarizer
If you have to shoot on brighter days a polarizer will help to cut the reflections of the sun’s light, which can be distracting in the overall composition especially when black and white photography is concerned.
6. Use Long Exposures
Long Exposures gives superb black and white photos. Try it out.
7. Shoot in Low ISO
You also need to shoot with the lowest possible ISO to ensure that the noise (grain) created by ISO does not become very obvious.
Low ISO Could Be Impractical: Though shooting in low ISO is preferred it may not be practical, especially for events like weddings. Experienced photographers feel that a High ISO makes the image feel more like film.
8. Check Your Results in LCD
Shoot several variations – color as well as black and white and check the results in your LCD.
9. Get a Good Photo Editing Software
If you have a good editing software program like Photoshop, you can easily make black and white photos using software programs. In addition you can edit several features to make your photos look better.
10. Learn to Use Software
You can also fix problems caused by bad lighting and do several other enhancements using software such as PhotoShop or Lightroom. This is also known as correcting the colorcasts. And to make your images look the best, you can even use techniques such as image manipulation to get sharp images. So spend some time figuring out the software.
Some tips on using photo editing software:
Use Silver Effex plugin in Photoshop to make black and white photos look fantastic.
Greyscale vs Black & White Photography: Greyscale images look lifeless and can be made to look much better. You can create top quality black and white digital photos using the channel mixer function in Photoshop.
Edit the colors in the HSL panel in Photoshop or Lightroom to get the best black and white image.