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CLICK HERE TO SEE A GALLERY OF IMAGES BY OUR RUNNERS-UP

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1st Place: "Between Sets" © C.J. Groth

Once again, we had hundreds of fantastic contest entries, making it very difficult to narrow down the selections to three top winners and a gallery for our latest "Double Exposure Challenge." Congratulations to C.J. Groth for being our first-place winner with her image, “Between Sets.” She has won the downloadable version of Bryce 6, a 3D landscape generating and animation program that really has to be seen to be appreciated. We also congratulate S P Mukherji as our second-place winner for his image, “Prayer for the Immortals.” He has won the book, Adobe Photoshop CS3: Photographer’s Guide. And finally, we congratulate Doug Brenner for being our third-place winner for his image of dewdrops. He has won the 2008 edition of Photographer’s Market. Take a look at images by our 15 runners-up in the accompanying gallery.

For more info on Bryce 6, please visit www.daz3d.com.
For more info on Adobe Photoshop CS3: Photographer’s Guide, visit www.courseptr.com.
For more info on 2008 Photographer’s Market, visit www.fwpublications.com.
 

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An Artistic Tool
Black-and-white imaging differs from color in two primary aspects: Aesthetics and craftsmanship. Because we see the world in color, the shades of gray that make up a monochromatic image offer a more abstract, interpretive view of reality. Black-and-white can be very striking when you want to emphasize patterns and contrasts, textures and forms, and draw attention to tonal relationships.

Black-and-white has long been considered a very artistic way to render an image, and of course in the very early days of film photography, it was the only option. Nonetheless, most magazine and newspaper photography in the 1940s through the ‘60s was shot in black-and-white, even though color had previously been introduced. Photographers like Edward Weston, Ansel Adams and Dorothea Lange made some wonderful black-and-white images with large-format cameras. This remained their medium of choice, and producing photographs in the traditional darkroom was a real art form for these and other great image-makers of their day.

2nd Place: "Prayer for the Immortals" © S P Mukherji

Film & Digital Darkrooms
Many serious photographers started out shooting black-and-white pictures, and most photography programs in schools started their students off in this medium. Traditional black-and-white processing and printing was easier to learn than color processing and printing. By the time film photography was in its prime during the late 20th century, commercial color processing and printing was less expensive than commercial black-and-white processing. However, many photo enthusiasts and professionals choose to express their artistic vision in black-and-white imaging today, and a lot of photography schools still begin their programs with black-and-white classes when teaching photography basics.

Some photographers still work with film and traditional materials in the darkroom. However, today, with the advent of digital imaging and the digital “darkroom,” creating a beautiful black-and-white photograph can be easier (and less messy) than it was during the heyday of the traditional darkroom. Most advanced digital cameras have the capability of shooting in a B&W or sepia mode, but you can get far better results by shooting in color and then converting your photos to black-and-white. Shooting in color gives you the versatility of creating a file in either color or black-and-white depending on your tastes, or perhaps those of your clients.

Different Methods of Conversion
When we talk about digital black-and-white images, we’re actually referring to “monochromatic” images, which have one 8-bit color channel, which makes it possible to represent 256 shades of gray. There are several ways to get a black-and-white 24-bit image. In Photoshop, the simplest way to convert a color image to black-and-white is to open your image file, and then choose Image > Mode > Grayscale. When it asks whether you want to discard color info, click OK. The colors in your image will be converted to black, white and shades of gray. The image remains a 24-bit image, but the color data is removed. This is the simplest method of arriving at a black-and-white photograph, but this method has its limitations and once the color is removed, the image file is altered permanently.

3rd Place: Untitled © Doug Brenner

If you’re familiar with adjusting hue, saturation and lightness, you may want to convert the image yourself by using the Image > Adjustment > Hue/Saturation command. This way, you’ll get a black-and-white image and the color information won’t be lost. You will also have more control over removing only the amount of color you want. Sometimes just a hint of color in a black-and-white photo can add to its impact. In addition to desaturating an image, it’s possible to change the hue, to add that slightly warmer brown or cooler blue that affects the mood of a photograph.

Experiment by using the Photoshop Hue/Saturation command on one of your color images. Move the Desaturation slider to the left until almost no color remains, and then play with the Hue slider to see how the tone of the image changes. When you get results that work well for you, save the file to a new file name (you may want to retain the original color image intact for future work). You may also want to experiment with dodging and burning certain areas of the photo, and use the Brightness/Contrast tool.

Another method of changing a color image to black-and-white is to use the Channel mixer in Photoshop. Open your image and click on the Channels Mixer tool in the Layers palette. Click on the Monochrome box in the Channel Mixer box to remove the color from the photo. By moving the sliders, you can increase or decrease the values of the red, green, and blue channels to produce similar effects to using color filters with black-and-white film. Again, you’ll want to experiment to see what works best for you.


Take our next Double Exposure Challenge! The theme for our next contest is “Children’s Portraits.” Find more information in the Call for Entries in this issue.

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CLICK HERE TO SEE A GALLERY OF IMAGES BY OUR RUNNERS-UP

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Let us know if you found this article useful, and tell us what kinds of articles you'd like to see in upcoming issues. Send your comments and ideas to Lynne Eodice.