Exploring the Art of Black and White Photography: Tips and Inspirations
Let’s take a trip into the go-back machine.
I knew I was interested in landscape photography around the time I moved into my first apartment after high school. Choosing the right “young adult” decor was a big deal back then, as it was just another form of self-expression.
Where most of my friends were buying blacklight posters of bands and trippy psychedelic prints, I opted for a more subdued approach and bought a bunch of pre-framed Ansel Adams prints. I didn’t know or care who he was at the time; I was just in love with the black and white landscape prints. My favorite was of El Capitan in Yosemite.
The funny thing is, even though I often consumed all forms of landscape photography, I never took a serious interest in exploring the trade myself. I had decent cameras and enjoyed taking lots of photos of the places I visited, but only as a fan. And I was terrible at developing my pictures (same problems exist to this day).
This brings me back to the primary point of this post: as somebody who always appreciated and loved black and white photography, why haven’t I explored it myself? To date my best examples are of a few birds, but I am working through my catalog finding older photos that are worth a second look.
Well, I can now officially say that my mind is starting to naturally pull in that direction as my creative intuition is being awakened, pulling from the subconscious influences of my past. Heavy stuff.
The Crows
My journey into exploring black and white photography started with two recent photos that I had developed - both of which I edited in color.
The first I published in my last post here, but I will share it for context.
I really love this image of crows sitting on this tree at a local state park. This was the first image where I thought, “Hey, this might be cool as a black and white image.” I don’t necessarily know why I thought this. Perhaps it was because of the contrast of the crows and their shapes on the tree. This image felt more “artistic” compared to my other images, which are primarily basic in nature (no pun intended).
With no intention to ignore my intuition, I started to play around with it a bit more until my friend Casey suggested I try a more “obscure” and “tighter crop” in black and white.
After a few attempts, I am happy to share the final product. What do you think? Does this image feel more natural and interesting in this crop and edit?
Tres Pelícanos
After this experience, I started to cull my catalog in Lightroom looking for other images I flagged as having potential, and I quickly found another candidate from a recent trip to La Push in Olympic National Park.
On this day, I only had roughly 30 minutes to stop by and check it out. My plan was never to visit the beach, but I was on my way back from the Hoh Rainforest and wanted to briefly scout the area to see what to expect so I could plan a longer session here in the future.
When I parked my car and came over the sandy brim in the parking lot, I was surprised to see dozens and dozens of brown pelicans feeding in the waters. Many would fly up, do a loop, and then dive bomb into the ocean with hopes of capturing some dinner. It was an exciting thing to witness!
I ran back to my truck, grabbed my 200-600mm lens, and went for it. The lighting was bad, very overcast skies, and I had a hard time getting any images that were not too noisy. I took roughly 1,000 photos within a 20-minute span, and after a brutal culling process, only found a few that had any potential.
The photo below is one of those examples. I just could not get it to look right. The image felt flat, naturally desaturated, and the detail and color blend just felt a bit too amateur to me. I did a few fast edits and moved on.
So when I came back to this catalog after processing my crow image, the solution was very clear - this image NEEDS to be in black and white. The answer was there all along; I was just not ready for it yet in my journey.
A few edits and adjustments later resulted in my final image below. Would you agree? Do you feel this image works better in black and white?
Finding Your Approach
If you are curious to explore black and white images in your photography, here are a few suggestions that might help nudge you along in identifying photos that have potential:
Lighting and Contrast
Images that have a strong contrast between light and shadow can often work very well processed as black and white. The effect can often be more dramatic with fewer distractions that often come with color images.
One way to know if a photo has this strong balance between light and dark is by reviewing your histogram and seeing how exposed your mid-tones are. For example, if your histogram shows two spikes on the left (blacks) and right (whites), then it already has a default exposure that may be easy to edit as a black and white image.
Details and Textures
Black and white photography often highlights textures and details in a way that can often be overlooked if developed in color. For example, the silhouette of the crows in my photo above is more prominent in black and white than it is in color, as the color image shows a larger variety in texture and exposure across all similar subjects.
Try and find any photo you have that might benefit from this. You can easily explore this by changing your color profile in Lightroom to “Adobe Monochrome” or by clicking on the “B&W” option under the “Basic” panel.
Give it a go and see if you have some images where the details and textures can be the hero.
Composition and Shapes
A reduction in color is going to put more of an emphasis on your composition and any shapes within your image. Silhouettes become stronger, and shapes, leading lines, patterns, etc. will typically be more emphasized.
My experience has also taught me that if you shoot with the edit in mind, you can identify opportunities in the field that will simply work better or be more complimentary as a black and white image, so taking those images with that intent might increase your keep rate. Where if you only approached the scene with color in mind, the opportunities can be diminished.
There is no right or wrong way, so feel empowered to explore and find what works best for you!