I have a habit of going out with the intent on making B&W photos, but often find myself switching over to color after a few shots. I really don’t know why I avoid monochrome photographs, but it almost always happens.
Winter, especially in southwest Michigan, is naturally monochrome – with a regular dose of cloud cover, leafless trees, and snow covering everything. I would expect that because of this naturally low-hanging fruit, that snapping photos without color saturation would just be easy. I approach winter photo walks (or other opportunities to make a photo) with that spark that “this will be the time when I make everything monochrome”. Often the session starts out with B&W pictures, but soon enough my temptress – color – creeps in and says “look at the tone of those browns in the bark”, or “here are some red berries on a leafless bush – those would look boring in B&W”. I cave and switch over to a color option in my camera (of course, this is a relevant topic only for digital photos – when shooting film, I accept the loaded stock and hope for the best).
Lately though, I have been embracing monochrome more and more – working with various settings to find that black and white profile that I think fits best with what I am snapping photos of. For the following photos, I have setup my Fujifilm X-T1 with the following recipe that I feel works well for nature things.
- Dynamic Range : DR400
- Film Simulation: Monochrome+R
- White Balance: Custom 2 – R+2, B+2
- Sharpness +1
- Highlight: +1
- Shadow: +1
- Noise Reduction: -2
These aren’t particularly crisp, but I like the tones and the bokeh that the Super Takumar 50mm f1.4 lens makes.
Same settings were used for some icicles that were hanging off of the roof. One big difference here is that the sun was out in full force, which provided some extra contrast (especially with the inside shots). Also, because the sky was clear, I really wanted to capture the blueness. So I snuck into a color setting (listed below) for that shot.
- Dynamic Range : DR400
- Film Simulation: Astia Soft
- White Balance: 6300K – R0, B0
- Color: -2
- Sharpness -2
- Highlight: -2
- Shadow: -2
- Noise Reduction: -2
We’ll see if I can harmonize more with monochrome photos. How about a photo challenge for February 2025? Stay tuned…