Getting dramatic B&W photos in Photoshop Elements 5

[adamsfour]

I am new to the digital SLR world but have been enjoying my Nikon D80 for a little over a month. I am shooting in color and then attempting to convert to B&W in Photoshop Elements 5. My problem is that I am getting a lot of grey tones. I am not getting the great contrast that really makes a B&W photo pop.

Can someone please share the technique to accomplish this?


Thanks!
Summer

 

[chrisk121]

Maybe increase the contrast?

 

[glaston]

I don't know how elements treats the B&W process.
In photoshop I use a B&W adjustment layer.

When you apply levels or curves, choose to enhance monochromatic contrast instead of clipping the color channels.
You want to find out what channel is cleanest for the B&W conversion, some people go with green all the time.
You can also set the dominant color to be black white or gray.
If I remember correct, a certain dominant color gives better contrast.

It makes a big difference whether you're correcting the image before discarding the color data too.
If you don't correct it, it's just converting the values to grayscale so it will be dull looking.
If you correct it, then it has the full tonal range to use in the conversion.

Generally speaking, the more contrast in the color image, the more contrast there will be in the conversion.
B&W won't take a dull image and make it look good, it will make it look worse.

So do all color corrections as you would if you were leaving it colored.
Then convert to B&W, and then play with the shadows and highlights again.