ESFotoClix Blog

Sometimes we return from an outing, only to discover that a scene we found compelling did not translate well into a photograph, primarily because of unappealing colors. Temptation to push contrast and saturation in post processing often follows such disappointment, but the product is often too far off the scale to please. It looks better, but it doesn’t come together.

I had such an experience after returning from a Spanish vacation 2 years ago with this image.

Biarritz harbor, Color

What I found compelling about the original scene, namely the rock harbor wall standing against the incoming storm, didn’t seem to come through when I reviewed the image on my computer screen. The scene came across as flat and unappealing. Attempts at color and contrast pumping, which I will spare you here, didn’t make the situation any better, and if anything distracted further from the story I was trying to tell when I snapped the photo. Had I misread the scene? Had I somehow used the wrong composition?

My recent exploration of B&W photography led me to take a second look. In the end, the solution wasn’t about sprucing up the color, but about abandoning it altogether in favor of emphasis on line (the sweeping curve of the rock harbor wall), and texture (the rock structure and the storm clouds). After some tinkering with B&W conversion techniques and a couple of iterations, I arrived at this version of the photograph.

Biarritz harbor, B&W

Another photograph from the same trip led to a different result. In this post-processed version, contrast and color pumping included, the juxtaposition of the old farmhouse (perhaps just a shack) in the foreground vs. the newer home down in the distance as a story-telling approach works nicely in color. However, personally, I found that as dominant as the farmhouse is in the foreground, my eye is drawn to the brilliant colors in the background, and the old structure becomes almost a momentary, incidental hook into the image.

Basque farmhouse, Color

Preferring to accentuate the old farmhouse, I gave B&W a try, this time taking care to selectively add contrast and sharpness to the rock face, further bringing out the texture and shape elements. The result is a moodier, starker image, and one that definitely causes my eye to explore the old structure for more than a second.

Basque farmhouse, B&W

Moral of the story: the next time you are left with a blah color photo, instead of pumping color and contrast, give B&W a try. Make sure you give yourself the greatest flexibility by shooting in your camera’s RAW format, and go ahead and explore what B&W can do for your photographs.

Note: You may want to search through this blog’s archives for past articles I’ve written on this topic to see how I’ve learned through the B&W exploration journey. I also strongly recommend Michael Freeman’s Mastering Black and White Digital Photography, which helped me greatly to see and realize the potential of B&W photography.

By now you’ve probably heard about digital photo “keepers,” and heard various, usually low percentages quoted as to how many photos people keep or consider worth printing or displaying on the Web. I must say that my keeper rate stays pretty much at around 5%. Even as my photographic skills improve, the ratio of good to bad photos has remained fairly constant, probably because I am becoming increasingly self-critical as I learn to evaluate and work on photos.

Now the question: what to do with the remaining 95% of your photos?

Here I must confess that while I do delete many photos, they have to be horrid or complete duplicates in order for me to delete them. Since I shoot RAW, this means I have a lot of bits and bytes lying around. Yes, I am a digital photo packrat, and I must say I have often felt guilty about it. I mean, if I die, who is going to plow through Terabytes of photos?

Who cares. Over the past weeks I’ve come to the conclusion that digital photo packratting is good. Here’s one example of an image from two years ago that I had pretty much given up for unworkable. Its two problems: a blown sky and very soft lens performance, by my then walk-about wonder, the Nikkor 18-200 VR.

My recent exploration into B&W photography led me to re-examine some of my old photos, and after applying the techniques I described in a previous article, in addition to some chicanery with adding a wispy sky (borrowed from another photo I took 2 hours earlier at the same location) through layer masking and blending, I came up with this version. I think you’ll agree it’s a much stronger image. In addition to really using texture and shadow vs. light contrasts, it gets rid of the things that took away from the color version, not only the blah sky, but the pipe on the left and the attention-getting green canopy are now more harmoniously integrated into the overall scene.

One often hears that post-processing cannot save a poor photo. While I generally agree, this image shows me that the potential I saw when I originally framed and took this shot could only be realized through effective, purposeful post-processing. So if you believe in the original vision you had for a photograph, go ahead and packrat it away. Who knows what you’ll be able to do with it a couple of years down the line when you learn a new technique or a fresh idea strikes your fancy.

In yesterday’s Mixing B&W with local contrast write-up we saw how adding tiny S-curves rather than one large one can increase local contrast and help separate detail, especially among shadows and highlights that would otherwise wash together. Following up on comments that the final resultant image was still a bit flat, I decided to use layers to see if I could create a composite with a little extra contrast.

The approach, as detailed yesterday, used Channel mixer for the initial B&W conversion. At that point, we duplicated layers. To the background layer, we applied the same curve shown in yesterday’s write-up, and to the foreground layer, we applied an S-curve, used Opacity of 20 with Luminance blending, as shown below.

The selected settings produce deeper shadows that still retain tone separation to portray detail. I like this a little better than yesterday’s outcome (shown on the right below), but it does feel like it’s a bit of a push as now the image is departing from the original scene by a wider margin. Any more than this, and I would stop feeling comfortable with the conversion, but this feels just about right on the edge.

Layered version: Click for larger image

Previous version: Click for larger image

As I keep exploring B&W conversion, I need to mention a book by Michael Freeman, Mastering Black & White Digital Photography that has led to my discovery of the techniques I note here. Freeman states that Channel mixer in particular, along with the ability to control local contrast through various techniques, pulls digital B&W processing to a higher level than was ever possible with film development. Of course, this somewhat side-steps the additional dynamic range that B&W (Tri-X in particular) offers. Nonetheless, just having gotten my feet wet with B&W conversion techniques, I am really beginning to appreciate Freeman’s assertion. And of course, we should not doubt that one day in the not too distant future, digital sensors will acquire dynamic range equal to, if not superior to film. In the meantime, we have HDR.