Hoya Red (25A) for BW shooting

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I just purchased a 52mm Hoya Red (25A) filter today, and it seems pretty cool. My problem is... HOW THE HECK DO I USE IT?! Haha. It seems that every photo I shoot turns out alright, then when I convert it to black and white, it looks REALLY underexposed, and some shades turn flat gray. Anyone got any tips on how to make my black and whites better with the filter!?

Thanks,

Ivan
 
I'm guessing you're using a digital SLR.. does your camera have an option to shoot in B&W instead of converting afterwards?

And how are you converting, just with desaturate/convert to greyscale, or are you using the channel mixer?
 
You'll need to post some before and after examples to get more help really. It sounds like you just need to tweak the levels a bit.

Rob
 
The red filter was really designed for increasing contrast using B&W Film. You maybe are having issues with the auto white balance (assuming it is on auto white balance). You can essentially do the same thing by converting to B&W using the Gradient Scale and/or Channel Mixer set to monochrome.
 
others here are correct, you should have saved your money that filter is not needed when shooting digital. Color photos are much lower in contrast compared to bw. BW needs contrast because there are only black and white shades. If you shoot with a red filter on color that is for the most part the only color you have in the photo so when you convert to bw there is only one shade of gray practically. So its going to look flat and with no contrast.

digital has eliminated the need for many accessories you can shoot the photo then do the converting when you get it in an editing program with the same results. A knowledgable person in a photo shop or camera shop if thats where you went and knew what you were buying it for should have told you.
 
also if you did want to try shooting the photo with a filter in BW most dslrs give you multiple presets so you can make a setting desaturating and adjusting the contrast and actually shoot the photo in BW, but even with that you could just desaturate and adjust your contrast to equal a red filter. Red filters are very extreme also you might want to try a yellow or green filter for contrast, they ad contrast but not quit as extreme plus you only loose about 1 stop compared to a red where you loose about 3 or 4 stops
 

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