B&W conversion technique in LR

[wbrandsma]

I posted some introduction to my B&W conversion technique in the GX100 thread today after many requests.

I use Adobe Lightroom to convert my photographs. Instead of using the Grayscale option in the Develop module I desaturate my photograph with the saturation sliders dragging to the left in the HSL panel. Then I adjust the color sliders with the Target adjustment tool in the Luminance panel. That way you can darken or brighten color area's in your photograph. That way you can preserve a lot gradation and tonalities. To enhance the contrast I use the Camera Calibration panel and the Tone Curve.

All the additional information can be read on my blog, but I think it will do justice here too.

Here some examples:






Do you have a similar technique in Lightroom or a different method? It would be great to share our methods here. Not only for Lightroom, but also for other applications.

[stephengilbert]

There's a video by Martin Evening that shows various LR B&W techniques here http://photoshopnews.com/stories/dow...scale_STD2.mov

It includes a version of the described technique.

[wbrandsma]

Thank you for the link Stephen. That is an excellent video tutorial, and great too that he used the same technique as well.

I am currently creating Develop presets to simulate B&W films in Lightroom.

[tmessenger]

This photo was converted to B&W in C1 using a JFI profile.

tm

[wbrandsma]

That looks very good with beautiful tonalities. It seems many achieve great results with C1 and JFI profiles.

[tmessenger]

Originally Posted by wbrandsma

That looks very good with beautiful tonalities. It seems many achieve great results with C1 and JFI profiles.

This was taken with the canon 350d, Oly OM 50/1.8 @ f8. and convertered with the JFI orange filter. Results are even better now with the new C1 4.1 then they were with the 3.~ LE versions. That's the neat thing about raw, older files reprocessed in the new converters can improve.

tm

[helenhill]

THANX WOUTER
Love ya Doll

I soooo Adore your work
now I can Practice some of your Technique
and expand into the world of B&W

best- H

[wbrandsma]

You're so welcome Helen