a morning chant: b&w/color?

[echoyjeff222]

Spent a week at a meditation retreat. Every morning at 6AM, a monk would chant for about half an hour - an ethereal experience. I liked the original color schema, but thought b&w might also work. Thoughts on the edit and b&w vs. color? I didn't do much to this besides slight contrast adjustments, but I think I'm happy with it ... I also have some shots that are more zoomed in to the monk (with just four columns as borders), but I think I like including the architecture more.

_MG_0794-Edit-2 by Jeffrey Lee, on Flickr

_MG_0794-Edit by Jeffrey Lee, on Flickr

 

[weepete]

Colour for me.

 

[binga63]

colour

 

[Derrel]

Color is my preference on this shot.

 

[Dean_Gretsch]

Definitely color with the 2 choices. Both are nice but the color photo has wonderful tones for such soft light.

 

[WhaleDaughter]

The color one has a better feeling of time (morning) that helps add emotional depth. I really like the warm light against the deep blue sky.


"Rule 408: Time is not the boss of you"

 

[BrentC]

Colour

 

[limr]

Speaking as a person who generally prefers b&w, I'm going with color on this one. The color of the sky signals the time of day, and I think that's a critical element in the 'story' of this image. That is lost in the b&w, as does the contrast between warm and cool of the lights vs sky.

I agree with the decision to include more of the architecture and context of the subject, though I would play with cropping some of the left side (and if so, a bit from the bottom for balance.) It's hard to say if it would help - I can't quite visualize it - but the darkness on the left side feels a bit heavy in the color version in a way that it doesn't in the black and white.

 

[echoyjeff222]

Thanks for the replies. I'll stick with color because it fits the mood. @limr, I played around with some crops but I felt cutting off the foreground streaks of light on the stairs reduced the depth of the image ...

 

[nerwin]

Man this is a tough one because I LOVE black & white. But like others, I think the color one makes the photo even stronger.