Some B&W C+C?

Weaving Wax · Jun 27, 2009

1.

Taken on the Rebel XT Settings: Shutter Speed 1/60. Aperture: f/11 50mm ISO 400.

2.

Rebel XT Settings: SS 1/400 A f/6.3 50mm ISO 400.

My black and white conversion seems a little bland. I clicked monocrome in channel selector in CS2. Is this a good way to convert to B&W?

Also, for these shots I used AV mode. Was my aperture off? I'm having trouble choosing the right aperture for the right lighting conditions. The original picture came out with a blue tint. my goal is to get the shots to look like I see them through the view finder. Is this unrealistic?

Are the shots any good?

Bitter Jeweler · Jun 27, 2009

They are both pretty bland and gray. The first one is kind of boring because the "subject" is centered. The second one holds more interest because it has a greater range of dark to light, angles, and more going on.

B&W conversions seem to be (in my eyes) most successful when you have a range of colors in the image to work with to create whites, blacks, and everything in between. Fewer colors in the image to start with allows for fewer tonal changes (to say it another way).

Weaving Wax · Jun 28, 2009

Bitter Jeweler said:
They are both pretty bland and gray. The first one is kind of boring because the "subject" is centered. The second one holds more interest because it has a greater range of dark to light, angles, and more going on.

B&W conversions seem to be (in my eyes) most successful when you have a range of colors in the image to work with to create whites, blacks, and everything in between. Fewer colors in the image to start with allows for fewer tonal changes (to say it another way).

Thanks!

Bitter Jeweler · Jun 28, 2009

Oh, even though I am not an expert, nor do I know all the subtleties involved in exellent exposure...Your aperture mainly influences the amount of light let in and the depth of field. You could have taken this with your aperture wide open, or stopped down. The blue tint you got sounds more like white balance issues rather.

KmH · Jun 28, 2009

As Bitter Jeweler mentioned, since your subject's are essentially all in the same plane aperture as a creative tool becomes nearly meaningless. As Bryan Peterson would put it in his book "Understanding Exposure" it's a situation where you can use a 'don't care' aperture like f/8 or f/11.

The aperture you select will have an inflluence on the shutter speed, which is a consideration for controlling camera shake as an example.

As far as selecting aperture per lighting conditions you have to also include shutter speed and ISO into your deliberations.

Any particluar scene will have 5 or 6 combinations of f-stop, shutter speed and ISO that will give a proper exposure but there is usually just 1 or 2 of those combinations that will produce the most pleasing or artistic image.

Hope that helps.