Beyond Desaturation: Make Dynamic Black & White Photos

I’ve had these three books for about 35 years, but haven’t opened them in a long time. I just started perusing The Camera again a few days ago. Even though the term “camera” means something quite different from Adam’s time the explanations and illustrations regarding how light behaves, optics, planes of focus, apertures and the rest are all really well done and very useful still. If I were to teach beginning photography I would reference this book a lot. Time to review the other two volumes. 🙏👏👏👏

Hahnemühle Photo Rag Baryta 315 gsm, this is a standard 'go to paper' especially for B&W followed by Fine Art Baryta 325 gsm for deep deep blacks.

A wonderful video. I had a teacher that told me that there are no stupid questions. So I'm going to be stupid and ask it. In the whole video, there is talk of tone, shadow, something like texture. I would enjoy hearing views about the subject. Is the subject tone, shadow, texture? is it a mountain range, a length of trees? How does the actual subject affect the image. Again, enjoy the site and thanks.

As I left photography this was an analog world and I was producing color trasparencies. As I came back, more than a decade later, photography had gone digital and post-processing software was widely available. Seeing GIMP was so complicated I got hold of LightZone which, as the name suggests, is based on the Zone System formulated by Ansel Adams. This is obviouly an ideal cost free tool for black & white.

I might mention, that if your source happens to be a color image, first apply any filters and then convert to B&W according to the formula Y = 0,11B + 0,30R + 0,59G. Do NOT simply „desaturate“! The formula delevers the photometrically correct input for your black and white processing.

Alex, your black and white images are so much stronger. There’s a moodiness, a vibe about them that is emotionally provocative. Thanks for another thoughtful video!

Great video 👍wonderful tips, thx for sharing

You’re camera has a light meter not sure why anyone would purchase one separate

Just rewatched this. I've recently become very dedicated to shooting black and white. This is one of my favorite chats of yours.

When one employs Adams’ Zone System one learns to “see” in back and white, literally, to be able to previsualize the image. However, that ability to “see” the image in black and white can be lost if ignored. Make no mistake, Adams’ also taught that no image is literal, it is always a creation, an interpretation of a scene that is a product both of exposure and darkroom. No Adam’s manipulated and massaged every print until it became the image he saw before he released the shutter. One would think (without really thinking) that this system cannot be replicated in the digital realm, but one must realize that the Zone System simply is a manipulation of densities and every piece of photo software (Photoshop, Affinity Photo, whatever) does exactly the same thing as Adams did in his darkroom. The software is literally a digital darkroom.

I think its much beter to use a spot meter to controll your highlights and shadows and to aim to specific zone for specific part of the frame

Great video, I love black and white images, but I believe rightly or wrongly I need to have a better understanding of my camera or buy an old SLR camera and use B&W film and learn.

E-min 4 Dmax baby!

Such an interesting and valuable video- thank you

I think this is some of the most useful and profound videos on how to create rich B&W images. Because digital makes transformations to B&W so quickly it’s easy to overlook all the additional work you can do to further enhance monochrome images. When necessary giving each part of an image it’s own tonal treatment by applying masks of varying levels, curves and contrast as well as burning & dodging will go a long way to achieving that goal.

Thanks for this really inspiring video Alex.

I’m new to your channel (just subscribed), and I’ll look for any videos you made that go in depth into dodging and burning. That seems to be a key element in the “negative” stage (maybe too the “print” stage). I mostly shoot digital and play with film. I need to work on my editing skills to keep my B&W images out of the *puddle*!!

I must be a philistine; most of Adam's images leave me cold. I find his contrast too high with too much that is black or white, which is not to say I'm a fan of the 50 shades within 5% of mid grey. The thing that I find attracts me to a black and white is the way it portrays texture.

Rather than fluff about with grey cards and external meters (I trust my cameras meter, used appropriately), why not just ETTR and fine tone tones in post?

I love how passionate you are about this!

Hi, Alex.
Is it possible to use the zone system from Ansel Adams in digital photography?
Antoine.

The negative is the score and the print is the performance--Ansel Adams

I achieve interesting black and white results using an infrared filter last year. Curiously it was closer to my pre-visualisation as I was going for something otherworldly on a piece of modern architecture. But it did occur to me at the time that these relatively inexpensive filters can help achieve the drama you get with snow. Only technical challenge is that they’re rated something nuts like 15 stops and everything comes out red to start with so using histograms etc is critical to get the exposure.

Love this video. I cannot work in the dark room now but I still shoot in black and white with my manual cameras. Over the years, I am seventy-five now, my emotions have changed, I have changed and my. subject matter has changed. I have read all three of Adam's books and studied with one od his students. Yet, I found out how difficult the process could be as paper disappeared from the market, film disappeared or became way too expensive. The Zone System testing is done for every film, with each of the lenses that you used was exceedingly time consuming but worth it if you had the time. I do not know if Ansel Adams would have switched to a digital darkroom but he might have. You are correct in that you need to know what you want in the end product and again, that change is okay. Get there as close as you can and make the changes over time with the energy and resources you have. Thank you.

Yep--even if you never shoot film, Ansel's "trilogy" (and his other books) are invaluable. His emphasis on pre-visualization and detailed explanations of how he created certain images not only gives you an appreciation and admiration for the often painstaking process involved in making those wonderful prints, but also how easy we have it if we choose the digital path. I still think you can get superior B&W images with film, but tools like Silver Effects Pro enable you to "dodge" and "burn" as well as apply many other filmesque techniques with the added advantages of ex post facto filter application (at any wavelength/intensity), very convincing film/grain emulation, and myriad other adjustments to help you realize your vision. The ability to undo/re-do and create/save custom presets is a bonus, as is the ability to highlight parts of the image that fall into the various Zones (and change as you adjust the exposure).

With an EVF you no longer need to "see the world in B&W" as you can view the scene in monochrome (or any number of "creative filters"). It's just too easy! I never rely on a camera's built-in light meter. In most cases, I just want to avoid blown-out highlights, so I avoid the zebras, as I can always recover shadow detail (I always shoot RAW+JPG and process the RAW using DxO PhotoLab's DeepPRIME XD to remove noise if necessary), but there are times when exposure bracketing can be helpful.

Oh, and thanks for including Ansel's explanation about reprinting the same negative--I've been looking for that.

During my family portraits I will often decide they are good candidates for black&white
I will tell them I'm going to shoot in B&W. To think in B&W moods. I let ot affect there movement, their attitudes and it changes the whole shoot.
They think of their favorite B&W magazine picture or they go to what they think of as film noir. It shows in the final edit.
⭐ ⭐ ⭐ 🌴 📸

My Grandpa inspired me to take up photography at an early age and some years later as a teen I remember giving him a book of Ansel Adams photos. I am a beginning adult piano student so maybe the music will inspire me to create some proper B&W snaps that please me at the least. Ta very much.

I have often thought the word twit was underused in adulthood.

The most important thing is the negative . To get rich tones on your darkroom prints your film must have a CLEAR BASE , If it has a medium to dark grey base iit will be a lost effort , you will never get a rich tone darkroom print . In 135 film there are a very few black and white films with a clear base like the 25 to 100 ISO 120 films . In 135 I use Rollei R 80 200 400 S films , Rollei RPX 25 also have a clear base . Before I used grey based 135 films in my Contax IIIA , I became dull darkroom prints , more or less a lost effort in expensive darkroom paper . Thats why I use most of the time medium format 6x7 . With the 135 Rollei RPX 25 or Superpan 200 I can get also rich tone prints from my Contax IIIA .

Honestly, I think the most fun way to shoot black and white is infrared. 720nm or 850nm specifically. With enough sunlight and a blue enough sky, you'll get those black or nearly black skies, but all of the foliage in your shots and most of the people in it and their clothes will be bright white. Cloudy day? Still not an issue. It'll either be nearly indistinguishable from any other black and white photo and be pretty good for it, or you'll still have the same bright white tones from organic matter and clothing but with flatter light.

Easy to edit? Not always. Fun? Definitely.

In regards to exposure: You can also set your camera to bracket and take 5 exposures quickly.

I never save my edited images on the computer. Who wants to print the same thing over and over? This is art, not a mass produced calendar photo. I keep the raw files, or the negatives, and that’s it

Even when I print in the darkroom, I don’t take notes. I want the prints to be different each time

A twit perhaps (like the rest of us) but an entertaining and informative one. 😁😁

What is the Wednesday class or activity you mentioned? Where to find it or how to join? Thanks.

Adding filters and importantly knowing what these filter do to light still does not produce a great photograph. AA trekked many thousands of miles. He spent a LIFETIME loving photography.

I'm almost exclusively do black and whites. Also, I almost only print black and white pictures which have some pure white and some pure black in it - and if they are many shades of grey between those two, I'm happy. The more of such shades, the happier I am.
The funny thing is, that in nearly every motif there is actually some pure white and some pure black present - and the art is, to see them and to expose the negative correctly that you have both in your negative, totally burnt out parts for pure whites and totally unmolested silver for the blacks (yes, I do film, not digital). For this, you mainly need to know your film and how it reacts to over- and underexposure.
I am not out for the perfect mid-tone grey exposure, I'm out for the best compromise of exposure to keep the blacks black and the whites white - what in the end probably leads to the same result. After all, with film, you expose it with just one aperture and shutter speed combination, and this one combination determines if you will have pure white and pure black to print. (Yes, I know that there are other "manipulations" available to influence this in the film developing, the enlarging, or in the scanning and printing processes, but those are nothing but workarounds to try to make the best out of a suboptimal exposed negative or a light situation which overtaxed the capacity of the film.)

Very cool to tell the story starting at the print.

Love this, thanks. Was just having this problem with a black and white photo. It's a still life, and I'm lacking a good lighting set up at the moment. I didn't even know Ansel Adams had written books!

I agree with you that you can’t get a great photo from a bad negative, except when you’re an Army photographer and you have a major on your rear telling to make him a publishable print. Somehow you do it. Multi contrast paper, burning and dodging and few other tricks get you a decent print.

I am making it a habit to comment on videos like this which is only about the art of photography ❤️

Passionate inspiration

It would be helpful to show Ansel's notes for the prints he made to make the idea you present clear to everyone. This will give you a deeper understanding of the photographic process. The explanation of the grey scale concept needs to be clarified. The idea is to choose where you want the mid-tone grey zone to fall. Then, if necessary, use a filter to help guide your proposed image toward your concept. Also keep a record of how you exposed and processed your photo. It is important to create a record of the complete process used to create your completed image

Hi Alex, have you done a video on John Sexton - probably the most successful of Ansel Adam's assistants - lovely sumptuous images rich in tonality and texture - "The Quiet Light" is a good starting point.

Excellent stuff - really good advice, explained clearly and succinctly without the need for annoying music, click bait titles or endless nagging to “like and subscribe “. I liked and subscribed.

Wonderful episode and thanks Alex. I have these ideas in my head of what I'd like to create, but have yet to learn the digital tools and techniques to experiment and then present them




them

So it looks like creating my ideal B&W photo is not determining the correct zone to shot at but rather creating a final product that is a mix of highlights and shadows that will draw in the eye and create an exciting composition whose appeal is log lasting.

I'll keep saying this. Your channel Is highly underrated