Hey all

Check out my Blog to see a short video clip I created on how I turned a normal color photo into a black and white fashion style image. This was my first time doing the whole recording desktop thing so bear with me....it will get better!

Enjoy.

www.damianlangere.blogspot.com

Let's not forget the cropping - that really strengthened the composition. (The pose, of course, was very good to start with.)

Your right, I forgot to mention cropping.Thanks!

Neat video - I like the music. I reallllly hope this doesn't offend, but I think the whites are too blown on his pants, and I think the desaturation method doesn't produce the widest gamut of grey tones. I personally prefer a gradient map of black to white instead of desaturation, but there are many, many, many other ways to get a beautiful black & white that doesn't look as flat as the desaturation method. Just my humble opinion.. feel free to ignore me.

thanks Anne! I actually totally agree with you about the whites. This was my quick and dirty way of making that photo look somewhat fashionable.

I heard that shooting in RAW leads to better gray tones. Do you know anything about that?
Could you explain more about gradient map?

RAW has a MUCH larger color gamut than JPG. Which means you get millions of shades of each color instead of a fraction of that. Once you edit a few events in RAW, you'll completely see the difference. The biggest difference can be noticed in the shadow and highlight ranges because you won't see as much clipping in both areas.

I'm pretty sure the way that gradient map works is that it takes the darkest point in the image and makes it black and the lightest point in the image and makes it white, regardless of the original original colors, whereas desaturate simply neutralizes the colors. To me, gradient map creates a look that is much closer to the high contrast black & white films that I love so much. When you look at the examples attached.... combare the differences in the color chart... but also look at the shadows on her face and the flowers to see how it handles the shades of skin tone. You'll notice there's a lot more differentiation between tones and shadows when using the gradient map (and more contrast).



After I use gradient map, the only adjustments I occasionally make are either auto levels or a bump in the middle curve to brighten skin tones. CS3 has a new Black & White tool in the adjustment layers which allows you to adjust each color tone for more or less brightness in the grays - so you can make red and peachy shades of skin a lighter glow. However, after trying it a few times, I still prefer gradient map the most because it's so quick and the results are usually the most consistently beautiful.

I'm looking forward to the video... but it's taking a LONG time to download (and we're high speed). Your 7-step written process is helpful! Thanks for sharing.

Anne Thank you for that visual lesson in gradient mapping!

How do you do a gradient map? I have always desaturated.

In your layers box, there's a little circle at the bottom which is half black/half white (adjustment layers), click on that and click on Gradient Map. Or.... image->adjustments->gradient map-> if black & white isn't your default gradient, click the gradient shown to see more options.

wow...that was awesome. Thank you for that!

Its funny but I actually prefer the look of the desaturated photo than the gradient one. I guess its somewhat a matter of preference. But I was thinking about creating my black and white image using the gradient tool than adjusting the levels to my likening. I'm going to give it a try.

thanks Anne!


Sorry if the video downloads slow...its Myspace...not your connection.

does anyone use a better service to upload videos? YouTube etc.?

Thanks Anne!!

All this time using photoshop, and I STILL learn something new about it every day!!

Thanks!!

Here is another way to create great black and white images......

1. create an new channel mixer layer.
2. click on the monochrome at bottom of window the opens up.
3. then make sure the r,g,b all equal 100.
a. For best result use red=30, green=60, blue=10. or 20,70,10.
b. just play with them untill you reach desired look but never have them total over 100.
4. open up a hue/saturation layer.
5. click on colorize.
6. adjust the top slider to 29
7. adjust the middle slider to desired tone.

8. PRINT!!

If it's photo related, always upload them here
www.simplephoto.tv

Photoshop also has a bunch of pre-built grayscale settings. Image/adjustments/grayscale/duotone/load grayscale. (should load from applications/CS/presets or something like that...you can also choose tri or quadtone and adjust the black on each color)

Some of these presets are pretty cool, but still kind flat compared to the gradient map.

I really like the B+W actions that Boutwell are selling too.

i think part of it too is that damien's clients are SOOOO hot. I actually met his original fashion e-session couple and holy smokes they looked like rockstars on the dancefloor at one of my weddings lol. damien - your photography is really awesome, edgy and different but the subjects weren't too bad on the eyes either lol! u really know how to excentuate the good features with amazing light though, i'd love to see a LIVE demo of this...asap

Sweet Anne....thanks for the tip!
I've never tried converting to B&W that way and it seems to work pretty well.
I'll have to add that to my arsenal.

Great picture - I use the same method that Jason McGrew does - it seems to give you more control over your gray tones than anything else.

great picture, but nothing you did in photoshop had anything to do with it

Haha! Thanks for kudos Tim! Its always nice to have good looking friends in front of the camera. I always challenge myself to make sure everyone looks like a super star in front of my camera. I can do it for anyone...I guarantee it. haha.

You can all see me in action in my Fashion Engagement video clip on my website..

Check it out.

www.damianlangere.com