 Tammy L. Bevins |
How to Convert a Digital Image to B&W What is the best method for converting a digital image to b&w and what process do you use? I have desaturated and then added contrast but I seem to be losing a lot of the gray values. I have seen conversions that look very rich and some even seem warm. Is this due to the lighting in the original shot or is this done in conversion? Thanks
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Wing Wong |
Hi Tammy, Did you use "desaturate" on the image or did you convert to greyscale? I know you said desaturate, but I just have to ask. :) If your copy of photoshop supports 16bit or lab color, try converting to that first, then perform the desaturation. This will help in preventing some loss of range. Once in 16bit mode and having performed the desaturate, try performing an auto-levels to have the range of the image spread out a bit. This will bring out some details and even out the light balance in the picture somewhat. Before running a contrast filter, try adjusting the curves to bring out detail and contrast. This is a manual kind of auto-levels and is a great way of tweaking the shadow and highlight detail of an image. This kind of adjustment is less lossy than using the contrast filter. When you're done, you can re-convert back to 8bit(24bit) mode from 16bit(48bit) mode. As for some shots looking rich, the richness of a BW pic tends, I think, to be determined by the blackness of the blacks and the whiteness of the whites.The quality of the contrast and sharpness of the picture will also contribute to richness. The impression of warmth can also be affected by the amount of "red" which has gotten into the black color. If you are willing, could you post a crop of the before and after pics?
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Tammy L. Bevins |
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