Colour vs Black & White

Lostkat · 10 Jul 2006 at 19:40

Was messing around on my new 30D (woooo!) yesterday taking some pics of the house plant on the windowsill, and I decided I'd see how the B&W versions would look in channel mixer. Was quite surprised at the results. The colour photos highlight the bright colour of the flowers, but you don't actually notice the textures until you remove the colours.

I know they're not the worlds greatest pics and I've not really processed them much (didn't even bother adding a border). Just thought that the huge difference between the effect of colour and B&W was quite interesting

Lostkat · 10 Jul 2006 at 19:40

Lostkat · 10 Jul 2006 at 20:02

Fantastic upgrade isn't it Sleepyd. So much faster!! I've been considering an upgrade for a while, but after being entrusted with rG-Tom's at the RR meet, I was sold. Gorgeous camera!!

Couple more - Wanted to show the centre of the flower.

HDR'd (3 stops either side)

HDR'd + B&W

Sorry if I'm spamming. Just feeling experimental

Lostkat · 10 Jul 2006 at 20:39

AdWright said:
Nice shots - the textures are good! I do prefer the punchy colour shots though.

The HDR shot doesn't seem to add much though - the other shots are well exposed as they are

Aye, I thought they'd bring out the centre of the flower more. Doesn't add much though, you're right.

Lostkat · 11 Jul 2006 at 06:33

titchard said:
The colour shots are far more vibrant and stand out a lot more, specially with the incredibly bright red and yellows, yet the B & W shots show more detail on the petals themselves.

Vibrance or Detail I think is your choice.

Rich

cyKey said:
Ah yes but the whole idea of black and white is to show contrasts, areas of light and shadow. These work well in both. Remember that the idea of photography is to play around and break perceptions.

By jove I think we've got it

The B&W or colour shots show the photos in completely different lights and make you concentrate on different aspects of the shot. I actually like both the colour & B&W shots for different reasons. If it came to printing them out for a wall though, I think I'd spend a little more time processing them and choose the B&W because I just love the texture of the petals and the white anthers.

Thanks for everyone's comments