Black and whites

[dreams of film]

Hi,

I am working with black and white right now. Some ideas on how to make these better would be great.

 

[MohaimenK]

Well let me ask first by how are you transferring these images to B&W?

 

[Alpha]

You range is very compressed. There's almost no shadow or highlight detail, and the midtones are pretty flat.

 

[rusty9]

how to make better: keep the subject in focus and don't center the subject. and only the last one is a decent B&W candidate

 

[Alpha]

No image is a poor candidate for black and white. There's nothing intrinsically good or bad about color.

 

[dreams of film]

These where shot on B&W film iso 100 scanned and uploaded. Now that I have put them up here I hate the shadows in #1, #2 was under florescent, how do I fix the coloring under florescent?, I like #3 but wish there was more contrast, how do I do that with just my camera and a flash with no extra equipment?, #4 was shot on a cloudy day with little shadows, any ideas.

 

[Petraio Prime]

Without going into too much detail:

Well in some cases you need to use the light better. Also, turn the camera vertical once in a while. B&W works better with strong light rather than soft light.

The couple on the bench...the background is obtrusive.

 

[gsgary]

Just had a quick play with 1 any better ?

 

[rusty9]

do you have a red filter? a red filter will give you some extra contrast.

 

[Alpha]

It's not contrast that's needed. It's detail. Contrast only increases apparent sharpness.

 

[Petraio Prime]

Just had a quick play with 1 any better ?

Well there's nothing about the photo that calls out for B&W treatment specifically. The angle is OK, but perhaps a better view of his face would be nice.

 

[Alpha]

These where shot on B&W film iso 100 scanned and uploaded. Now that I have put them up here I hate the shadows in #1, #2 was under florescent, how do I fix the coloring under florescent?, I like #3 but wish there was more contrast, how do I do that with just my camera and a flash with no extra equipment?, #4 was shot on a cloudy day with little shadows, any ideas.

For areas where you've only got fluorescent, you can shoot with an FLD filter.

As for the second question, what film were you shooting? Where/how was it developed? How was it scanned?

 

[Petraio Prime]

These where shot on B&W film iso 100 scanned and uploaded. Now that I have put them up here I hate the shadows in #1, #2 was under florescent, how do I fix the coloring under florescent?, I like #3 but wish there was more contrast, how do I do that with just my camera and a flash with no extra equipment?, #4 was shot on a cloudy day with little shadows, any ideas.

Cloudy days are not the best for B&W. You need texture, shadow, contour, and depth for most subject matter. So, on cloudy days you just wait for sun...

 

[dreams of film]

Alpha; the film is kodak, I took it to my local camera shop as I don't have a darkroom of my own yet, and I scanned it with my husbands scanner/printer/fax.

 

[Alpha]

Cloudy days are not the best for B&W. You need texture, shadow, contour, and depth for most subject matter. So, on cloudy days you just wait for sun...

In fact, there are some days when the weather is so bad that you shouldn't take any photos at all! This is silly dogma.