Black and White photography Tips

Beginner Black and White photography Tips

If your into Photography, you will know that taking a picture is all about capturing, different shades of light, angles and depth. Often the best pictures are taken either in the morning or, evening sun. I think colour and black and white photography is at its best during these times.

In my opinion I feel colour photography presents a blur of an image as nothing really stands out. This is where black and white photography comes into its own. Its a challenge to find the perfect contrast between black and white and at times presents very striking photos.

For those of you who are not into black and white photography i will give you a task. Pick a scene, take a colour shot and take a black and white shot. Come back to me and tell me which image reveals the most striking capture. Black and white photography tells a story as opposed to a colour photograph telling you its a nice sunny day or that round object over there is an orange. Anyway I am here to tell you about Black and White Tips as opposed to black and white V's Colour.

How to capture the best black and white photography images

In order to be able to take good black and white photos you will need to spend a few weeks taking shots of everything. Sometimes when starting out to take black and white photos it is very hard to see what makes a good shot as your brain is viewing everything in colour. The only way you will find your happy medium is by learning from doing. You will train your mind in time as you will be able to look further than colours. If you keep in mind my following points when taking a black and white picture you will find it much easier to see past the colour and focus on the object and light in question.

1.Form, Shape and Space When you are taking a black and white photograph focus on what you want to take the picture of, it may be a shape or an object. Figure out which angle would reveal the best shapes and shades of light. Remember when you take away the blur of colour from an image the only thing left is the object itself.

2. Contrast Contrast in black and white photography can be exciting as you need different shades of light to make an image stand out. As we have taken colour away your brain can not define the object as your brain needs two things 1.Light intensity and 2.Colour. Without colour your mind focuses on light intensity. You need to train your eye to view objects in black and white before you take the shot. In black and white photography it is best to capture an image which has different shades of light from one extreme of light to the other extreme of darkness. This method will outline the image you are taking. So for example you need to take an image of high contrast.

3. Pattern If you are a fan of taking black and white photograph patterns, this is where black and white shots really do patterns justice. Colour shots tend to take your eye from the pattern itself but black and white will remove the colour and allow you to appreciate the contrast between the pattern itself. For instance if you take a picture of an orange, your mind will say "Oh thats an orange, and thats all you will see as the orange is round and an orange colour. Take the colour orange away and you will start to focus on the pattern.

4. Texture Texture can be seen in the same way as patterns. You can take pictures of any subject such as a leaf, tree, water or grass. The porblem is when you take a picture in colour of a leaf, your mind will tell you that the picture is a brown, green leaf and you will not see the detail. If you take a black and white photo of a leaf, your mind will not automatically know what the object is and will result in you focusing on the texture instead. When taking photos in colour texture is lost, but once you are trained in black and white photography you will begin to focus on texture more, revealing very unique black and white pictures. Texture is sometimes very hard to find, a good method to find texture is to "focus in" on an object. The texture will become clear. Sometimes texture itself reveals pictures. Since colour is taken away your mind must identify the object by a pattern or design it might see.

5. Lighting In order to get your black and white photograph to stand out, you will need light. Light is the key to your photo. Unlike colour photos you can take the same photograph many times using different angles and you will always have the same image because your mind tells you what the image is. However in black and white photography every photograph you take will be different as Depth, Contrast, Pattern and Texture changes with every angle you take.

6. ISO Everyone here knows that light can be a photographers worst enemy and best friend. I am thinking many people here have gone out and tried to take photos in poor light or dull days. This results in a blur shot or a dull image. This is because the camera is starved for light and decreases the shutter speed making it harder to achieve still images. A good trick is to increase the ISO settings. This may give you a better image for that shot. Remember though to reduce the ISO when you have taken the shot as ISO sometimes gives a grainy image. Obviously the best option is to have ISO reduced at all times unless needs be.

Conclusion I hope the above points will focus you a bit more on what to look out for when taking black and white photos. There are two main points to note. Use light to be able to frame your objects and over time try to picture everything without colour. This will automatically focus your mind on the texture and pattern of objects.

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