In monochrome photography, portraits become more expressive, landscapes become more dramatic, and many subjects show up in a whole new way. Black and white photography is coming back into fashion, even though it has never lost its relevance. So why is it still so popular?
Black and white photography reminds us of old photographs, first movies and TV shows. Black and white pictures are very effective and allow you to create more expressive images, emphasizing the shape and shades of your subject. In some cases, black and white images leave a stronger impression than similar photos in color.
When to go for black and white
In certain situations, black and white photography will be the best solution. Below are some examples that we recommend you consider.
Winter landscapes
Black and white photography is a good solution for capturing winter landscapes. As a rule, this time of year is not abundant with bright colors – there is no riot of greenery around anymore and only some reds and yellows. The palette of the snowy landscape is already monochromatic in itself. So you can pay special attention in your pictures to the forms of leafless trees, stone walls and buildings. Composition and contrast become the key elements of the image.
The rule of thirds is especially useful when composing black-and-white photos, when there are no bright colors and shades to distract the viewer’s attention. Imagine there’s a grid in the camera viewfinder – two vertical lines and two horizontal lines intersecting at four points. Try to compose your shot so that the main subject is located at one of these intersection points. This will help build a winning composition.
Another method of composition – the perspective going into the distance. An example of how to use this technique is to photograph a road taken from an overhead point, or photograph railroad tracks that take your eye beyond the horizon. The lines of the road or tracks create the illusion of convergence, even though we know they are parallel to each other. These lines draw the viewer’s attention to the photograph and take their gaze deeper into the image.
Portraits
Black and white portrait photography looks really winning and interesting. This is partly because many of the iconic portraits created in the last hundred years are in black and white, so this style seems familiar and familiar to us. But it is also due to the fact that monochrome pictures more accurately convey the character of the characters and emphasize their individuality.
The additional side lighting makes the photo especially expressive by creating a strong contrast between the light and dark areas of the image.
Cityscapes
Quite often photographers give preference to black and white photography when photographing architectural objects. It allows you to accentuate the very shape of buildings. Compared to color photography, black and white produces more contrast, which is especially important when photographing such subjects.
Photographers often prefer to take pictures of architectural objects in the early morning hours, not only because there are still few cars or people on the streets, but also because the sun is low over the horizon. It makes the shadows last long and the texture of the rough stone and concrete looks really impressive and draws the viewer’s attention. The simplicity and austerity of black and white photography adds a special expressiveness to urban landscapes.
Night Photography
Night scenes work equally well with black and white or color photos. Quite often the yellow light of the street lamps brings the scene to life. At the same time, the monochrome image allows you to shift the emphasis to the patterns and textures present in the photograph.
The role of color
Quite often, special filters are used to change the hue of black and white photos shot on film. Yellow and red filters, for example, absorb the blue color, so the sky appears darker in the picture.
Using Filters
Filters not only help give a photo a special expressiveness, but also increase the contrast between the white clouds and the sky. In addition, various filter effects are available in the image style settings on digital cameras. You can select yellow, red, orange, or green to change the tones of the monochrome image and create a special filter effect. Refer to your camera’s instruction manual for more information.
See the world in black and white
You don’t have to shoot in monochrome to create black and white photos; you can take color photos, then copy them and convert the images into black and white photos after transferring the files to your computer. But don’t forget that there are subjects in which color photos look much more advantageous than black and white photos, and vice versa.
For example, a color photo of red flowers against a background of greenery looks very expressive. But on the black and white version of such a photo, the red and green colors will have the same gray hue.
Learning to see the world in black and white takes some practice, but you can master this skill more quickly. You will notice that as a rule, when shooting the same subject, the contrast level of a black and white image should be higher than the contrast level of a color image. Shoot the same scene or subject twice, first in color and then in monochrome. The two images can be compared directly on the camera’s LCD screen.
Shooting in JPEG and RAW format
Images can be saved in a variety of formats. The format you choose depends on what you plan to do with the images in the future.
We recommend the RAW file format for night photography since it offers more editing possibilities in the editor than JPEG images. When shooting in this format you also have no need to use noise reduction when using a slow shutter speed on your camera – you can reduce the noise.
Most of the noise is removed by the camera while the image is being saved on the memory card. However, it takes as long as it took to expose the image. For example, if you shot an image with a two-minute exposure, it will take another two minutes of processing before you see the finished image on the screen. You will not be able to continue shooting during this time.
Subjects
Now that you know the technique for taking pictures at night, you just have to choose the right subject and the right lighting.
The most effective photos are taken right after sunset, during twilight. During this time, the sky on the horizon is still lit up, even though the sun has already set. The light of the setting sun is much warmer than the light of the sun at the zenith, which is why we can so often see the sky colored in beautiful colors during twilight. Virtually the same thing we can observe at sunrise. So if you can’t get a shot of your subject when it’s dusk, try getting up early. You might get even better pictures of the rising sun.
If you live in the city, city lights can be a great subject. Try taking pictures of neon lights, light installations, and burning building windows. Take your pictures at different exposures, and see how different your pictures turn out. Pictures taken right after a rainstorm, with the city lights reflected in the wet roads and puddles on the sidewalk, will be even more interesting.
Great for shooting fireworks as well. Long shutter speeds are used to capture trails and individual flashes of fireworks. Set the camera to manual shooting mode (M), choose an aperture value between f/8 and f/16 and a shutter speed of 5 to 10 seconds. The shutter speed depends a great deal on how often the individual fireworks flashes will appear in the sky.
You may be able to focus using autofocus, but it will probably be very difficult to do so in the dark. Therefore, it is better to set the focus switch on the lens to manual focus (MF) mode and focus on an object that is the same distance from you as the fireworks.
All digital cameras can produce JPEG images. Such images are processed in the camera and all unwanted image data is removed. You can open the JPEG file with the software that came with your camera and make the changes you want. For example, convert a color image to black and white. But at the same time you will not be able to work with all of the image data, so making some changes will not be possible.
If you like working with images on a computer, it is best to shoot in RAW format. Almost all cameras create images in RAW format. This format allows you to save all the data captured with the camera, which in turn expands the possibilities for subsequent processing of the resulting photos. You can apply a red, yellow or green filter effect to enhance contrast or give the image a sepia, blue or purple tint.