Back in the 80s, when I was starting out working for newspapers, BW was the only choice. In order to get a feel for tones, I got a blue gel filter to look through. It worked very well, robbing the colors in a given scene, and concentrating the eye to shape, light and shadow. After a few days, the lesson was learned. Don't know if this adds to the conversation, but it was a big help to me in the early PJ days.

I can't emphasize enough how much value I get out of these videos. I am truly grateful for your knowledge and your willingness to share.

Alan Schaller does some great work with a Leica monochrome. Just more modern and it’s great to see work that future photographer’s might aspire to.

@9:26 is why I love this channel. Most people would cut it out or record it. Not here, here the photographers and their photography is what's most important, and being authentic when talking about their work really makes this channel an extra type of special

Michael McKenna is another master of B&W. I love his work.

Yousuf Karsh. Thank you TPE for yet another thoughtful offering.

Fan Ho has long been my favourite. Some people in the past have pointed out that his photography was dramatically staged (it was - he was also a film director) and therefore it was somehow 'fake'. But, for me, the main difference between him and Ansell Adams is that the content of Adams' photos moved infinitesimally slowly compared to that of Fan Ho. So the latter found a good way to slow his content down. Other than that, they are both great examples of how to capture the luminance in a scene to its best advantage. And I think that their approaches to photography are applicable across the board, no matter what style or genre one shoots.

I love the Acros preset on Fuji. The issue is so many people just black and white think it’s a cheesy filter selected.

Let’s change some words here. It’s not B&W or monochrome. It’s luminosity which is being recorded, and through doing so it forms the skeleton over which is draped the flesh of colour, otherwise known as chroma. It is possible to train one’s eyes to see simultaneously in both luminosity and chroma. It is possible to add and subtract colour to drape a monochrome scene and make it look convincing in colour, but you need a great monochrome image to start with. I love all the photographers you have shown, but my favourite is Sebastian Salgado who really understands this.

I love Black and White photography, its what my old dad taught me, He used to develop his own and had a little darkroom at home. My dads old job was a printer and he used to also do the lithoplates. Love your videos.

Infrared black & white images are my favorites. 💛

You're easily becoming one of my favorite people to watch on YT right now. And not just for entertainment but to actually learn something new. After being bombarded with IG photographers, trying to sell you presets and LUTs, your channel is a fresh change in the right direction... I love that you focus on the EYE and the SEEING and the LOOKING instead of GEAR/PRESETS. Keep posting great content like that! It's super valuable and highly appreciated!

If you've been catching up on Expressive Photography videos, you know how much Alister talks about contrast and luminosity. That's what monochrome is all about. I mainly shoot landscapes in color, but I've shot more B&W this year than ever before and I plan to use more monochrome in my work. The easiest way for me to "see in black and white" is to take off my glasses and squint. Forms become indistinct and colors become muted, but contrast and luminosity become more evident.

Excellent piece! I started out shooting both color (Kodachrome) and Tri-X back in the late 1970's. Once I started delving more into b&w with the books of Ansel Adams, I knew that is the way I wanted to go. While Adams got my thrill of b&w started with his books, it was the subject matter of HCB that inspired my desire to hopefully, one day, be a newspaper shooter. I did finally achieve that goal after a successful career in electronics and engineering raising a family but I have to say that working for a small town weekly newspaper that showcased photography was the highlight of my working career. All of the prints I have personally made, either digitally or in the wet darkroom, have been b&w and, having sold all my digital pro gear, I am enjoying relearning the Sunny 16 rule with Tri-X in a vintage Yashica Electro35 GS. Love your channel and will continue to revisit each time you post. Thanks for taking the time to put together something more than gear talks!

In addition to the aforementioned greats I applaud and acknowledge two great sources of inspiration: James Vanderzee and Jane Bown who pulled me out of the ennui I was experiencing when I felt I had no focus or purpose in photography.

I did a recent self project of shooting in Black and White. Black and White allows me to bring out the textures of an object, as well as the light and shadow. This time of the year has strong light and shadow, which is great for Black and White imagery. Thanks for sharing a great video!

A good way to start to see in BW are the mirrorless cameras. Personally I use Fujifilm for that and created a "reciept" in camera that gives.me a JPG the way I like it. I always shoot in JPG+RAW but by being able to create a "formula" for BW in the camera helps a lot for both looking at the scene in BW but also reduces the PP requirement on a great degree.

You can use liveview on your camera to see what the scene will look like in b&w. On Nikon you can also create your own color b&w profiles to simulate high/low contrast film, or add a red color filter etc (Picture Control Utility). This can be useful when looking for a composition when out in the field, in PS/Lightroom you can tweak the settings to your liking. Thanks for the excellent video!

9:51 "Anton Corbjin was - or is - a rock" Amazing

Excellent post. Thanks. Having a firm understanding of “visual hierarchy” is very helpful in working between color and BW. As you mentioned we can remove color to “smush” things together where color might have separated them. Or we can remove color and focus on contrast or texture to separate things that would have melded together in color. Not understanding how color/BW interact with visual hierarchy is, I think, a main cause of some photographers being disappointed in their BW conversions. Something else to keep in mind is that BW and color are not at odds with one another photographically. They carry no relative weight or value against one another and are simply distinct ways of seeing or showing with images. Be careful not to fall into the trap of believing a BW conversion is simply a way to revive or enhance an otherwise mediocre color image.

Excellent presentation! A year ago I bought and now shoot exclusively with a Leica Q2 Monochrom: it removes the prejudice of color. I now seem to see the world in shapes of light vs colors of light.

Thank you again. I always learn so much from you videos that give real useful and extremely valuable information on how to improve ourselves.

I first discovered Anton when I picked up the U2 album Joshua Tree. I fell in love with his tonal range and the gritty look of his work. When I worked with film I tried so hard to emulate that look with different exposures and development techniques. I did come out with my own style which has shown up in my digital work. Thanks for the post. It makes me want to go back to 35mm black and white film and processing.

When I shoot B/W I always turn my EVF in B/W, it will improve your shooting so much !!. And don't be afraid of over exposed whites, they often will help you. Color shots will show you a person, B/W will show you their soul !!!!

Have you ever imagined, if you would, what a photograph of a soul would look like. Excuse the macabre nature of that thought, but to me, that is what Black & White is so good at. It peals back the layers of the onion to reveal the basic elements of your subject. Fantastic video….very insightful…Thank you

I only just caught the last couple of minutes of the premiere and had to go back to the beginning to get the context for everything :-). You always lay your thoughts out in a way that builds and is easy to follow and understand. B&W is near and dear to my heart. It was what my father gave me to start out with ( I won't say how long ago that was because it is long ago). Not sure if that had an influence on my preferences over the years but when I went to digital I continued to shoot many images with the intent of turning them B&W in post. Now with mirrorless cameras you get to see B&W through the camera too which is amazing! Just over a year ago I began shooting film again and my choice was B&W. It has grown into a bit of an obsession to the point where if I load a roll of colour film I can't decide on what to shoot LoL! Strangely, I don't have that issue if I am shooting digital. Shooting B&W so much has really taught me to focus (just like you said) on shape, form, light, shadow, and contrast. Even scenes that most would think should be photographed in colour can be rendered in a very interesting and unexpected way in B&W - recently I photographed a forest scene in autumn colour on B&W film and I love the result! Thanks for doing what you do! I look forward to all of your videos!

My favorite Black and White photographers are for sure Jacob Aue Sobol and Daidō Moriyama. I learned about their work in college and I even met Jacob Aue Sobol in person at Paris Photo as we had an excursion with our lecturer.

Thank you a helpful and enjoyable video. I have wrestled with black and white hotography for decades and never quite settled with it. My eyesight is unusually sensitive and colours pop out everywhere, the way my brain processes sight is unusual which is one reason photogrphy is so interesting to me, I see more colour than most people. I have been trying for so long to see past colours into tones and record them. I am also synesthesic and for me colours have a taste giving them more power, the absence of colour does not taste meaning I have to rely on sight only which is a strange thing to me. Your video has given me something else to use to get beyond colour and taste into tones.

As inspirational as Ansel Adams was (is) to photography, he might debate your opening statement that great B&W photography doesn’t come from the processing of the image. In his case, it most certainly did as his most famous images in original form look nothing like the final product. He was a master of the chemical process and truly advanced the work in the darkroom to achieve what we all appreciate in his images. Just tour the Ansel Adams Gallery in Yosemite to learn more about the depth of his darkroom technique and how his images evolved in processing...most people would be amazing at looking at a ‘before and after’ of one of his famous images. He was well ahead of his time in that area and this is not to take anything away from amazing composition and storytelling abilities which are superior in many ways.

Thanks Alex, just another inspiring video. Usually I only do black and white conversions for my infrared photography, but tonight I may go out with my standard camera and shoot some flowers, trees, landscape, whatever I can find. Thanks again

Thank you so much for this video. I love the sample pictures in it. It shows how much diverse can B&W be.

I just discovered You Chanel and it's my favorite after watching literally 3 videos.

For sure it is easier to compose a shot in B+W than colour, ie a strong red in the wrong place is going to drag your eye to it If you look at some of the minimalistic colour work of Franco Fontana or the work of Maarten Rots then colour adds to it. As you said it is wise to see in B+W which is great on EVFs as you just switch it to mono and with various film sims and custom settings you get a good idea of the end result.

This was just fantastic. Outstanding content for those who want to take it to the next level.

When I shoot digital (I shoot mainly b&w film), I set my evf to monochrome. It allows me to see what the image will look like and not be distracted by colors. I shoot in RAW so I can still play with RGB sensitivity and balance in the final b&w image.

I end up editing a lot of my photos to b&w. It started when I tried out a tip I got about how to decide if an image is worth keeping. The idea was to try every photo in b&w when editing. If it doesen´t work stripped of coulors it´s missing something in composition. So I went through with this for a long time and found myself converting fewer and fewer images back to colour.

Danke, Thank you for talking about 'black & white' photography..............I prefer to shoot mostly in this way, as it fore fills my love of photography in a way colour can not do. I enjoy your KZfaq videos. Keep shooting. Phil...🦊📷

Thank you for another excellent presentation. Totally agree about Adams. The key to his method was not in the exposure/developing/printing. It was in the pre-visualization. He decided ahead of time the outcome he wanted and used his technical skill to achieve it.

I’d love to see more videos about black and white on this channel

Unfortunateley great photography is no longer widely appreciated, especially on social media where everyone is an expert.

This gave me some helpful new perspectives on the benefits of and techniques for black and white photography, and the examples are wonderful. "Epic" is a perfect description for Sebastiao Salgado's work; he's one of my favorite photographers. Thank you.

black & white photography is like listening with your eyes

BW unifies the scene. I don't like shooting digital and then deciding to convert the images. I prefer shooting film, grab a camera loaded with BW stock and head out. I am committed. (you can of course set your camera to output BW jpeg.) It can feel limiting, not every scene translates - but BW can deliver a deep sense of satisfaction. The tones of sunset clouds, a colorful flower rendered in satin white. Also when starting out, learning to edit color can be very difficult. Thanks Alec-

I love Black & WHITE.

Wow! I always thought fan ho was the king but that second photographer Sebastiao his work is epic!!!!! 🔥🔥

Terrific video. Over the last year, I have been doing more and more black and white photography. Everything you discussed is something I need to practice to get better. Thanks.

I began with B&W because that is what "serious" photographers were supposed to shoot. Although I think that idea is silly, it did help make me better. When I started taking colour seriously, my goal was to make a shot that would look good in B&W as well. My understanding has matured and I realise that colour isn't less serious or less artistic. They each allow different takes on making images. I dislike the talk of "fixing it in post" or that one can "get it right" in camera. One should strive to take the best image for one's purpose that one can, but the darkroom is a significant part of photography.

5:45 = best photo I've seen in my life. I'm blown away Thank you for this video

As someone who typically works in black and white, your points are sound! Someone else in the comments mentioned Alan Schaller - excellent photographer! David Yarrow also comes to mind. Salgado is perhaps one of my favorites alongside Paul Strand and Ansel/Edward Weston. Excellent video! It is always encouraging to hear more about black and white photography!

I’m actually completely colour blind, and completely relate to this. Colour has zero influence on what I shoot, it’s merely about light and dark and what shapes/lines are created.

I would also say Alan Schaller is very interesting to look at when it comes to black and white photography

Thank you so much for this video. Fantastic.. I start shooting in black and white and this video is so helpful. ❤❤❤❤

As a complete novice, just getting back into B&W after many years, This is extremely helpful. All of these photographs in this vid are quite inspiring. I sure would like to know the settings were used for these photos presented. The photo @5:56 is absolutely stunning!

I realized during this video Re: Black and White photography that for 6 years; while working as a Coppersmith at a Shipyard, I lived in a black and white world every day due to the nature of the industrial environment of Naval ship construction (poor lighting, cramped spaces,no windows,large plate steel surroundings) .

Regarding your comment towards 7:00, a subject's lightness/darkness in BN will be affected depending on the subject's hue, saturation and lightness, colors will reflect light differently depending on these factors. In your case, your skin may be light but also has a "red" hue to it, so for a BN photo, a blue or green background will most likely have the biggest contrast under an evenly lit situation. I just recently stumbled upon your channel and have found it incredibly uself, given your focus on thinking the image instead of just worrying about gear.

I think the phrase seeing in black and white is a bit of a mysterious concept for the beginner, as are some basic words like "tone". I like to explain the situation in terms of the brightness level of the color in and image (tone). For example (examples for the best lessons) red and green of the same brightness level will be indistinguishable in black and white. There is only contrast: a little or a lot.

For years I’ve tried to like black and white photography but I just couldn’t get into it, and I don’t know whether it's the beautiful examples you show while you're talking, what you talk about or just how well you colour graded and lit the footage of yourself, but now I’m suddenly all into it, even if it's just for the sake of learning to do better colour photography. I can for instance see how an experiment of taking black-and-white JPEGs for composition and using that as a reference and inspiration for how I grade the raw file in color would be educational, useful, inspiring, broadening, refining and all the other adjectives running through my head. I'm so excited! Edit: I just tried this out by taking BW photos in the harsh 12:00 winter sunlight and then first upping the saturation in the shadow areas and making a grading scale that progressively lowers the luminance with the saturation. It looks like classic, analog photography! Now I think growing up on BW photography is probably the reason (besides unparalleled talent) that legendary photographers like Saul Leiter where so effective

I have just started watching your channel and although all the content is very worthwhile I found this offering of special interest as I use B&W often. Using a monotone screen on the camera has aided me not only in B&W but also in color (sorry, colour). I do agree with the points you make but I felt there was particular point that might have been unintentionally a bit limiting. To see the photo in B&W is, of course, desired. Yet to develop that skill I have found that post-processing color images to B&W aided me in developing the "eye," to learn what works and what does not. Also, I would like to mention, Jeremy Walker from your side of pond as a very good B&W photographer.

I love black and white photography but rarely try it. I know I can set my viewfinder to black and white but I'm convinced the sort of images I like have been heavily post processed. The black and white images I've taken that I liked were edited in Nik Silver Efex. I've seen a couple of tutorials in Photoshop that look good but I just don't find Photoshop intuitive to use which is probably why actions and presets are popular. Still trying to find my ideal solution to achieve the black and white images I want.

1:10 The Tetons ! Just west of my home, a sight I looked at them every day ( that it wasn't too snowy ) as I was growing up in Jackson, WY. love'm love'm love'm !

Zone system is a "darkroom" as well as a "camera lens/film" endeavor, and IMO there is a significant question as to whether 21st century lenses with 1 to 2 dozen elements can maintain the subtlety around the midtone gray (50% printer) to reproduce the wedge-steps required to do it. In the early 70, as a paid darkroom tech for a research lab we spent a lot of time maximizing the process to produce as many wedges from a 32 step scale as we could (optical density 0.00 to 4.00 being the unattainable ideal)We were printing microscope 35mm (Pan-X shot and processed at about an ISO (ASA) of about 10) of fruit fly chromosomes and needed to be able to consistently pull out ALL the gray subtleties. With digital processing but more importantly digital viewing, the impact just isn't there, and it's really hard to print it with a mechanical head printer. Durst Lambda prints are the way to go.

Fabulous. I like the comment that b/w photos turn a subject into a sculpture.

It was so nice to see someone showcase the greats of our time .I love Immogen Cunningham and Edward Weston . I love photo history and think it’s so worth learning about . Great video

As usual, THANKS for all your posts !

One theme here.....every photographer here is a film shooter(unless I missed one); Much harder getting these results with a digital sensor because the Achilles hell of digital is highlight gradation since black & white is all about the highlights and film overloads gracefully into white whereas digital's highlights clip abruptly and look terrible once it hits white since there is no gradual overload to white unlike film. Monochrome sensors also suffer from the same issue as well. (edit; this is not a hipster anti-digital comment...color photography in digital is far easier for great results) You really need to think different when shooting digital and it's more complicated than using a Fujifilm preset or a Leica monochrome camera.

I love black and white, and I know there are loads of photographers who I could have included here. Who is your favourite that wasn't featured?

Still love your videos. The links you provide are also very educational and informative. The links YOU provide also show that your videos are about photography, about us and not about you. You are the least unselfish KZfaqr I have ever seen and I am very grateful and thankful for finding your channel.

Ansel Adams talked about visualizing the final print as you were considering a scene, to know what values your planned combination of film, filter, developer, paper, dodging/burning and print processing were going to give you. When shooting with digital cameras we have advantages Ansel didn’t have, namely that we can convert the color image later using the channel mixer in the editing program. With film you are locked in to how your film/filter/processing combination “sees” the world. With in-camera jpegs, the camera software becomes part of your creative process, locking in how that camera/software sees the world. By shooting color and converting later using channel mixer you can decide the tonal relationships between the colors and interpret a scene many different ways. So if you are shooting black and white digitally, visualize how your software will be part of your creative process.

Enjoyed the video. I enjoy dabbling in black and white once in a while, when I was taking photography courses, we were only allowed to shoot black and white except on rare occasions. Ansel Adams is among my favorite photographers, I really get a lot of inspiration from his work. His work is also featured in that book 'Timeless Images by Arizona Highways' that I mentioned a few videos back. I really like looking at his landscape work.

Thank you for the video lesson. 🙂

One thing I love about B&W photography is that annoying traffic cone is no longer annoying. In color that one cone would drive the viewer quickly away.

You have got me motivated to go out a do some serious b&w shooting.

So considered and articulate. Indeed, ‘biblical’ is the exact word to describe Salgado’s work.

Great video. I always make time for mono images and still love the art. Your videos are immensely valuable and add breadth.

subscribed cos you explained so well and calming

A spent a period when I had my digital camera take only black and white pictures, simply to be able to see immediatley what my images looked like without colour. That was a wonderfully productive learning experience.

Great photography Video. No one could explain B/W Photography in such an appropiate and detailed manner. Thank you very much!

I know Ansel Adams was a devotee of the Zone System, but it was originally created by Minor White.

There is a lot to say about this subject. You managed to say most of it in this short video. Thanks for making the case for BW photography!

I found you channel today, and so far, I have found tons of inspiration. Thanks a lot for this wonderful explanation!

Top quality presentation and theme discussion Thank you. RS. Canada

Absolutely wonderful video. Once, I started intentionally going out and shooting in black and white it's been a great help to the rest of my photography. One of the main benefits of shooting mirrorless is being able to set it to black and white even in the evf to really see the world without color.

Always a relevant video! Thanks.

Thanks Alex really enjoyed this video.

Thank you so much for this channel. Narration is fantastic with great voice.

I really appreciated that you recorded this in B&W, funny and so cool.

Another wonderful video! Thank you for your perspective

This is one of the best KZfaq recommendations I've gotten in quite a while... Fantastic video, thank you!

I would love to see you do a video on Catherine Leroy and her photos from the Vietnam war

I liked working in black and white because of the control it gave me over my workflow. I got to master several aspects of previsualisation. I knew how different filmstocks behaved, how to meter the scene, how to expose in bright contrasty light compared with soft diffuse light, which lenses and filters gave me tonality and plasticity. I could decide on which developer and dilutions and processing method would give me the qualities in my negatives that suited the subject. The darkroom techniques and choices were also about the image. Only when I started using professional labs or reversal film did colour images become exciting. It had seemed that taking a film in to be processed returned dreadful machine prints, there was no drama the colours were wrong, they were mis-cropped, soft, they scratched the negatives. The pro labs put the time in and suddenly all the time and skill I put into taking the image along with lens quality was apparent. Suddenly colour was a real option when it was done properly. I was inspired by so many great black and white photographers and the art of making great prints that are compelling. The effort involved in arriving at a black and white image is far from just removing the colour, it’s a whole collection of practices.

Like, like and like. What a great video. Thank you!

Great selection of photographers - and your usual insightful commentary. Many thanks, Alex.

I shoot various black and white film stock. This is an excellent and inspiring video, thank you.

As always profound thoughts! I've always struggled with taking black and white photos myself. I tried and tried but never got the eye for seeing subjects in black and white. But after this video I'll give it a try again. Thanks for your inspiring work!

As usual, great video.

absolutely love Black & White an trying to craft my skills,or lack there of. An not trying.to pigeonhole myself to only b/w by no means...it's just I love b/w photos an taking some nice work. love your channel BTW

CORBIJN, of course!

informative content.

Well done my man.

I have followed many of these photographers, thanks for putting together this epic video.