B&W & Sepia...?

Question

For those of you digital shooters, when you are looking for a specific b&w or sepia shot, do you:

A) Shoot color, and de-sat afterward in photo-editor??

or do you

B) make the adjustment in camera to b&w or Sepia??

For those that do it in an editor, do you start with grayscale, and adjust tones, etc..., or just use a percentage of de-sat (or negative color saturation)??

Personally, I shoot everything in color mode, and de-sat afterward. I was wondering about un-neccesary on-camera functions.

Whats your opinion?? Does it matter with digital??

Answer 1

Shoot in color. I just read that "all" cameras shoot it in color and then desat in the camera, generally degrading the image. You may as well use the better computing power of your desktop/laptop and get the most out of your image. Besides, you never know when you just might want all or part of the image in color. (Haha!) And I do NOT mean to suggest that you might one day want to turn a small portion of your sepia image red. I mean that you might want to use the original color image or just a portion of it.

I amusing Photoshop Elements 5.0 and it has a B&W conversion feature that allows you to leave a bit of color. See http://www.flickr.com/photos/samfeinstein/1665364467/ for an example. (Once again, I do not mean leaving one item in the image in color.) You can do the same thing without the proprietary function. Sort of. First you have to boost one color and then you desaturate the whole image by about 90%. I like to keep some blue most of the time, but keeping red will give you a warmer end point.

Here's an example of the technique.
1. Open an image.
2. Open the saturation controls. [CTRL]+[U]
3. Drop down the color selections.
4. Choose red, for instance.
5. Set red to +10 or more.
6. Drop down the color selections again.
7. Choose Master.
8. Slide the master saturation over to about -90.
9. Hit "OK" and see if you like it.

To compare to a total desaturation, hit [CTRL]+[SHIFT]+[U] and see how it changes. It will be subtle, but you will see the difference. I think this works because most so-called B&W papers have a native color of their own and most B&W prints are not really pure B&W.

As a rule, I don't play with saturation or sharpness in the camera. Why should I when the computer has so much more horsepower? Also, NOT doing it in the camera leaves you so many more options in the computer. You are always starting at "zero" if you have not altered it in the camera.

Having said all that...

One of my cameras is a Nikon Coolpix 5400. Funny. At the time I bought it, I thought it would be the best digital camera I ever owned. It was - at the time - my dream digital camera! Anyhow, it has a black and white mode that is accessed via the saturation menu. The manual says, "Black and white images require the same amount of memory as color images, but show a higher level of detail." I never really analyzed this claim, though.

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Mason Torey has a great tutorial site - see his answer below for the link - and one of his lessons is about converting to black and white. He goes into MUCH more detail on this subject. If Mason picks up this question and answers, please rate his answer over mine as I don't want to steal his thunder.

Answer 2

Wow! All kinds of good answers ... and a few nutty ones, as usual!

Dr. Sam has it down!

I have a slightly different take. since I'm creating a body of work in sepia, i want all the images to have the same tint and quality.

I've learned that I can best accomplish this by shooting in color - that's all a digital camera can do! - converting the Grayscale, then converting again to Duotone. Actually Tritone.

I make my first layer black, the second a shade of yellow and the third a shade of red/orange. Then I tweak.

Once I've created the look I want I'll do proof prints. then, if it's right, I'll lock that setting in and Load it into the Duotone menu so that I can reload it for every image that'll end up in that particular body of work.

Don't ask for more specifics. It's taken me years to devise the exact formula. I, and several other pros I know, guard our personal Tritone mixes like gold.

Always readjust Levels AFTER setting the Tritone.

Answer 3

For Black and White I ALWAYS shoot in Black and White mode.

The reason why is I use filtration such as polarizer and such, One needs to be precise on the effect. For instance if I use a polarizer and #25 filter I may be under on my exposure without the previsualization.

Now I always shoot in RAW. But in the processing of the Raw image I will convert those back into color. I have tested this extensively and this is dramatically better, especially in dark skies.

So once I have my RAW color file I convert that to Tiff and put it into photoshop.

Now NEVER EVER simply use the Desaturate commands. If you do not have time for photoshop work then shoot the picture in B@w mode the image will be much better. There are several good methods to convert to B@W.

Here are two.
http://www.designbyfire.com/?p=17

http://video.about.com/graphicssoft/black-and-white-photo-making.htm

Now. I will use my version of the top method. For a sepia I will convert it to a Tritone even though I only need a duotone.
This will give you one more curve that can give you more control in the highlights and shadows. You will get cleaner whites using this method. Just pick the family of colors u want to work with and adjust the curves in the tritones curves boxes that will pop up.
Hope this isn't too complicated.
Here is a link to my Venice Pic using the above method

http://www.michaellohrphotography.com/frames/sub_index_pages/index_land.htm

Answer 4

Dr. Sam is right--all digital cameras take the camera in color anyway, then convert it to black and white or sepia. Better conversions take place on your computer. I actually saw one just 2 nights ago was hard to tell it was a digital conversion. In fact, the judge had to ask to be sure it was a digital conversion.

Answer 5

I always shoot in color and convert later if I want in B&W. Reason: what if I would have liked that image in "color" but shot in the camera as b&w.

You can also convert your images in "Lab Color". Go to the top of the menu in Photoshop go to "Image" then "Mode" then "Lab Color" now go over to your "Channels" and turn off "A&B" and you will see a difference of your b&w images. You can try doing the same image in gray scale, desaturate and in lab color and sitting them side by side to compare results.

Also here is a link for you to look at some tips there are at least 3 in there on how to change from color to b&w.

http://www.russellbrown.com/tips_tech.html

Hope this helps,
Kevin

Answer 6

Always in post shoot. I don't go out with the specific purpose of shooting something for a sepia, duotone or grayscale print. I sometimes "think" about a particular subject as being a good candidate for such, in which case, my "eye" is looking for higher contrast lighting or positions that bring out that contrast.

Not really much different when shooting B&W film, or processing sepia toned prints in the old days. (whoooh! what a stinky process THAT was!)

Answer 7

Is better to do it right on your camera if it has the option. If not, then go straight to your photo editor and from there one should go on to the sepia effect...for the software it does not matter the original ....it is so advanced that you can do whatever you want.

Answer 8

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Answer 9

I always desaturate or make it sepia afterward. Firstly, becasue it is easier. Secondly, why only have the picture in b&w or sepia if you can have both and in color?

Answer 10

Photograph in color!! Once you photograph in black, there's a big limit to what you could do to enhance the photo and modify it. You can always make color into a tint or black and white.