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G10 B&W Conversion - C&C?

Joan

New member
Hi Oxide Blu,

Yes, I've seen beautiful stuff done with the Silver Efex software. I think they are now making the plug-in for Aperture, too, right? It's on my list of wants ... unfortunately that list is long and exceeds my budget right now. All of my cash seems to go to my son in college, kids are expensive critters. :rolleyes:
 
O

Oliver

Guest
I really like the look of Brian's approach. Even on the butterfly shot (which I also prefer as color) - I think the tonality of the B&W is as good as it would get, just works better as a color shot. Maybe with lots of masking work in post, you could get a good B&W isolating the butterfly, but anyway - I think it's just a great color shot.

Another option for B&W shooting is using a profile during raw conversion, I hear good things about the JFI profiles that mimic the color response of various B&W films. Which may be good or not depending on how you feel about legacy looks.
 

Lili

New member
One of the best features of Digital Cameras is...

The LCD screen...and to make it B&W. Looking at the screen is seeing the print in front of you...it has abstracted a 3 dimensional reality to a 2 dimensional reality and further abstracts the new reality by making the image B&W. It's even better than my 8x10 Deardorff because of the B&W screen....sooooooo.....

use it.......
I completely agree here, it is exactly how I use my GRD for B&W work.
Edit; actually it is how I use any Liveview camera.
 

Joan

New member
Thanks, Oliver. There are a lot of things I want to try as I learn more about post processing. I have always been a color enthusiast and think of myself as a primarily a colorist with my watercolor paintings. But there is something about B&W photography that seems so elegant and "pure" ... don't really know the words to describe how I respond to it, but I'd really like to get good at it! Don's point about using the LCD to help "see" in B&W is a very good starting point, and when/if I can afford to buy the Panny G1 with it's large EVF to view in monochrome, that will be even more helpful.

My very favorite photos from growing up are all the B&W shots that were taken with my dad's Polaroid land camera. They still look amazing 40+ years later and I've scanned and enlarged them to preserve in my scrapbooks with quite a bit of success. It's funny, but I can remember the colors of all the things in those vacation pictures even though they were recorded in black and white.
 

Joan

New member
Lili, lol, looks like we were typing at the same time. :) This really is a no-brainer, isn't it. And I should know this as I've spent years and years doing little monochrome studies to work out the values for my paintings. It's the same thing, just in a different medium. I'll be switching to RAW + monochrome jpeg shooting henceforth!
 

Joan

New member
Alright, here's todays' attempt. Done in Lightzone and toned a bit with "palladium" preset. This looks better fullscreen, but I think it holds up OK. A little vignetting might help, but I don't have a program on my Mac that does that right now.

 

Joan

New member
Thanks, Helen. :) Wish there were people sitting at the tables ... then I would really like it.
 
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