Photography.....

[Lucky13]

Quite a few times, I've come across pics in both colour and B/W, now in the last Milwaukee Road there's a few super B/W's.....question is, what it is that sometimes makes a B/W photos.....I don't know, it just has it, but in colour, if it should exist in colour, it's just another photo, what is it in B/W's that sometimes makes them......magic?

 

[Airframes]

Sometimes the lighting, or the type of process. The 'duo-tone' process, much loved by US Press and PR photographers in the 1940's to 1960's, certainly gave a monochrome image a lot of 'punch', and specialist Bromide printing papers, along with either the lighting and/or process, provided a very dramatic, high contrast effect, whilst maintaining the details in the mid-tones.

 

[Lucky13]

The pic that made think, by Richard Steinheimer and his book, The Electric Way Across the Mountains.....somehow, I don't think that it'd have the same punch in colour...

Sorry for the quality...

The light up in the left corner is the moon, so this a night photo....

 

[pbehn]

There are many ideas for this, colour vision is centred around the focal spot in the eye but black and white vision is around the whole eye. Black and white photos are frequently sharper and without the distraction of colour more atmospheric.

 

[Gnomey]

Certainly in a night-time situation I find black and white photos just work better because of the way the eye perceives the different colours of light. That and the contrast seems much sharper in them which can add atmosphere (as does the lack of colour in a way).

 

[vikingBerserker]

I have to totally agree about B&W Photos and it's really hard for me to figure out why. I think a woman in B&W just looks elegant and just stunning.

I think pbehn might have a point, the colors are almost distracting at times.

 

[fubar57]

Yep, black white is the best but I like to add one lightly tinted color to the image away from them main focal point of the image because I'm a jerk.

Geo

 

[pbehn]

I have to totally agree about B&W Photos and it's really hard for me to figure out why. I think a woman in B&W just looks elegant and just stunning.

I think pbehn might have a point, the colors are almost distracting at times.

As I remember from school biology colour is detected by cones in the eye and black white by rods. Rods are much more sensitive in low light which is why we only see in black and white in dim light. Our eyes therefore see in higher definition in black and white and detect contrasts and tones we dont detect in colour.