DSLR Photography Forum

Still working with B&W... This time I worked with other settings and added some other layes to get the sky this color...

Do you think it is ok?

Thanks for your comments

Its a nice shot Irma. It is an idyllic scene that is greatly improved by the sheep.

What technique are you using for converting to B&W? I ask because I suspect (perhaps falsely) that what you have done is a "desaturate". I suspect this because the contrast is very flat across all the color channels of the photo (even B&W photos have color channels - strangely enough).

If you create a new channel mixer layer and then select monochrome mode - you can have far more control over the contrast in the various color channels. In this copy of your photo, I have boosted the green to 100 and decreased the blue to -70. You can see how it sharpens the photo.

This is not meant to be the ultimate rendition - it is just a 2 second edit to show you how you can add "snap" to a B&W treatment, without sacrificing any of the detail. If I did a straight levels boost across the board - I would lose detail in the whites (such as the clouds)

Sorry for messing with it.

Irma, nice work I really like it the mill has chartacter. I like both versions, yours and Toads they each have their own mood.........

cheers

Nice image Irma. Not quite sure where to comment as I haven't really involved myself in B&W yet. Toad has done a good job as well.

Thanks for your comments

Russt, I like pictures of mills... I have already three... the other two are very nice as well, but I wasn't that lucky when I took those pictures, they don't have a nice sky... it is a boring blue sky.... This picture was taken in an Open Air museum, I went last weekend. The place is great and they have some mills among a lot of interesting things

Toad, I worked the Channel Mixer to convert the picture to B&W following Mitch tutorial. My settings are R=+56, G=+88 and B=-40 total 104. I didn't use Mitch's because I wanted to experiment and get a darker sky... so I tried my own settings... I was wrong... I just went to my file and I tried +100, +100, -70 in the Channel Mixer layer and it worked perfect.... I could even switch off that layer I painted to darken the sky!! I find it much better



You are a Master!!

Just a question if I may....

Here is the original size of this picture, and here is the original size I tried with one of Mitch actions... In my picture I can see a line like aberration along the right part of the mill and the left side of the sheep, while in Mitch's action there is none... It looks clean... My question is why this happens?... and if you think it would matter if I printed this picture...

Thanks a lot for your help...

Thank you for kind words Irma - but I am not a Master - just feeding back Photoshop tricks that others have shown me in the past or that I have read in books. The secret to getting dramatic skies using the channel mixer is setting the blue channel very low - basically equivalent to using a red filter on a black and white film photo. This trick has been described as "Ansel Adamish". I still find it very odd and non-intutitive to discuss B&W photos in terms of color.

As for the line-like abberation - I assume you are talking about the slight halo that occurs when there is a hard difference beween the light and dark areas - for example the shadowed side of the sheep or the dark mill against the lighter sky. These look like sharpening halos to me - but I could be wrong. Are these photos sharpened and does the halo exist on the original right out of the camera? If it is there right out of the camera - try reducing the degree of default sharpening on your camera. It may also be some sort of sensor bleed or chromatic fringe on the original color photo - but I am not competent to discuss the engineering issues around this.

I also see this line to a lesser extent on the one you did with Mitch's action, but because the contrast is much less - they do not show so much.

Sorry not to be of more help.

I have checked the original and it has this halo... I will change the settings in the camera and try again.. Thanks Toad for your comment/advice, it was very helpful

I love the shot, Irma. The broken windmill and sheep make for a very interesting scene.

Beautiful shot, Irma. It has a lovely European quiet countryside feel to it

Thanks Schellamo, ST.
I was lucky when I got this picture, I think. First because of the sky and then because there weren't people around... As it is holliday time now, everywhere we go is crowded, and it is difficult to take pictures sometimes...