Black and white photography is seeing a revival in all fields. Photographers who really like the idea of working with shapes, tones, and like to be very specific about their scenes have found that black and white is really perfect for them. In times past, photographers mostly used black and white as a way to…
So why not just get that in-camera to begin with?
…in that way, you can cover up or embrace those flaws that others may be distracted by with a simple conversion to black and white.
It’s a fact, photographers love contrast. But it doesn’t always work out so well–case in point: portraiture! Don’t believe me? Well, let’s consider the fact that photographers for many years have been shooting with a low contrast film called Kodak Portra to photograph people. Crazy, right? So what made people want to do high contrast portraits? Most of the time, folks unfortunately just don’t know any better. But when it comes to black and white photography, we have to showcase to you how and how too much contrast can kill a portrait.
Take a look at our lead image: would you say that it is a high contrast photo or a low contrast photo? What’s your justification for your answer? The truth is that it’s a medium contrast image that just had the blue and orange channels manipulated. If you were paying attention to our previous tutorial, you’ll understand how color channels can affect a whole lot in the scene that you’re photographing and editing and how white balance compounds on top of that. If you look online, lots of photographers love a specific recipe: black and white > high contrast > clarity raise > export. But the truth is that that doesn’t always work out so well unless it’s done specifically well and lit in a very specific way.
Creative vision is what matters in the end no matter what the internet may tell you about rangefinder cameras.
When you go about taking pictures with your smartphone, you’re probably not going about thinking into the scenes too much. For the most part, the beauty of smartphone photography is how candid it can be if you’re just looking for a quick photo. But lots of folks either use their smartphone as their primary camera or they feel confident enough in their abilities to produce great work. With so much technology packed into today’s phones, it’s indeed incredibly simple to take better photos.
We’re going to get you started from the ground up.
Anyone that has done smartphone photography before in the past knows that the secret to outputting better photos isn’t in the shooting process necessarily but in the post-production process. With that said, you’ll need the best apps that you can get your hands on to do something better. Unlike actual, dedicated cameras, everything with a smartphone is done via software of some sort. Everyone obviously knows about and uses Instagram, but if you’re not exploring other options then you should strongly consider these.
It’s just a tool. Nothing more.
The decisive moment is one in street photography that is often spoken about being captured, but it can also be created.
Leading lines: they’re one of the first things that every photographer learns about when it comes to shooting images in school. If you learned online and without format training, then you probably studied the rule of thirds first. But when you’re looking at a photo, one of the best ways ro artfully create an image that photographers have traditionally been taught is by using leading lines. Call it a rule that needs to be broken, it’s still a very effective one that when done correctly, can trump pretty much any other rule out there with the exception of using text in an image. For many years, black and white photography was the way to go. But when color came around, things changed quite a bit.So let’s explore leading lines and black and white photography.
“Silver gelatin photography changed the world by democratizing photography.”
For some photographers, printing is the ultimate way of displaying their photos.
Ilford films are available for pretty much any type of photographer that you can name or list. At the moment, they have the largest selection of black and white films on the market as it is pretty much all that they produce. So with that said, there’s no good reason why landscape photographers would have been left out. Many photographers shoot landscapes as a hobby and very few actually end up selling prints of their images or being commissioned for tourist reasons. The look that Ilford film can provide is one that’s quite interesting. There are tons of photographers out there who shoot digital and simply try to create keystoned HDR photos. But that’s not really what film does.
The company quite literally specializes in black and white film and for that reason they offer a multitude of products for a multitude of applications.
“…if you didn’t know any better, you’d probably just completely skip the fact that there is indeed black and white instant film out there.”
“Look at what has happened on Instagram, look at the selfie world and the increasing amount of pay-per-view sites that photographers and models can make quick cash by selling ‘naughty’ photos online. I want nothing to do with that.”
“Maturing in the world of photography I realize that the correct gear helps to create a personal vision.”
“Capturing a person’s life and personality through a photograph is such a wonderful challenge…”