Plh Photography wrote:
Greg Gorman has a good technique. A pdf of the steps and how to create a Photoshop action is available on his website.

Will take a look.
thxs

biwa wrote:
What works best using photoshop.

Yes, if you're using digital, using Photoshop is probably best.

OK, OK. "Best" is image-specific.

Good ways?

Gradient Map.
Black-and-White conversion layer (CS3/4) It uses a mix of the Hue/Saturation stack and selective color approaches, but puts them together in a single easier to use package.
Hue/Saturation stack (described below)
Lab's L channel
Greg Gorman's approach. Tutorial on his website (See under Learn)
The Light's Right tutorial

An easy, and often satisfactory approach is Julianne Kost/Russell Brown's approach, which uses 2 Hue/Saturation layers: the upper one to remove saturation, and the lower to permit fine-tuning of individual color ranges. That plus a custom curve can be made very effective for batch operations. Russell's video explains how. (This appears to be the basis for the B/W Conversion adjustment in CS3, but that’s a guess.)

A PDF of the handout I use in class summarizes the above and some other techniques is also available. It has links to more elaborate explanations.

The most powerful is probably using Calculations on channels, building things up until they're where you want them, but it's not obvious or intuitive. (Here's one tutorial to get you started.)

Jeff Schewe explains an excellent (if complex) conversion method in this PDF.

Northlight gives overviews of a number of techniques on this page.

biwa wrote:
Also what considerations do you do for the different races ?

Some of the techniques permit some adjustments based on hue or saturation. More important is knowing the overall balance of skin coloration, and what you want to emphasis. For example, all 'races' have, in RGB, a predominantly red bias, and that's where the least variation will show. A larger red component will reduce the visibility of blemishes, while a larger blue will emphasize those blemishes. Green often works as a compromise, with 'enough' texture. (Much of this can be seen with a little experimentation using the Black and White Adjustment layers in CS3 or later, but even looking at the original Red, Green, and Blue channels can show this.)

To emphasize skin texture--older people for 'character'--I often start with the blue channel, and mix the others in to taste. To DE-emphasize skin texture--younger people (especially models)--I often start with Red, and add the others to taste.

Rancho Santa Fe Photo wrote:
Does anyone use Nik Silver Efex Pro?

Not yet, but I hear it's wonderful for conversions.

Michael Puff wrote:
I've used a number of the PS techniques to convert to B&W...all work well depending on the original image and you're desired outcome, IMHO.

The last year or so, I've been doing my B&W conversions in ACR (Adobe Camera Raw).  I find the combination of the HSL/Greyscale tab along with the Tone Curve and Basic tabs to be quite powerful.  I'm getting a consistent and extremely satisfying result in ACR across a wide variety of images.  Fine tuning can easily be applied in PhotoShop.

You saving your settings as ACR defaults?

Leroy Dickson wrote:
You saving your settings as ACR defaults?

I haven't, but as a matter of workflow I suspect you could and tune from a basic set of defaults.  I approach each image individually because that's just me and I'm content with getting one image per editing session.  I do realize that won't work for many folks. 

I think you could also convert a single image from a photo session to B&W (particularly if from a controlled studio session) and synchronize those ACR settings to the other images in the session to get a head start on editing multiple images in ACR.

Kevin_Connery wrote:
Yes, if you're using digital, using Photoshop is probably best.

OK, OK. "Best" is image-specific.

Good ways?

Gradient Map.
Black-and-White conversion layer (CS3/4) It uses a mix of the Hue/Saturation stack and selective color approaches, but puts them together in a single easier to use package.
Hue/Saturation stack (described below)
Lab's L channel
Greg Gorman's approach. Tutorial on his website (See under Learn)
The Light's Right tutorial

An easy, and often satisfactory approach is Julianne Kost/Russell Brown's approach, which uses 2 Hue/Saturation layers: the upper one to remove saturation, and the lower to permit fine-tuning of individual color ranges. That plus a custom curve can be made very effective for batch operations. Russell's video explains how. (This appears to be the basis for the B/W Conversion adjustment in CS3, but that’s a guess.)

A PDF of the handout I use in class summarizes the above and some other techniques is also available. It has links to more elaborate explanations.

The most powerful is probably using Calculations on channels, building things up until they're where you want them, but it's not obvious or intuitive. (Here's one tutorial to get you started.)

Jeff Schewe explains an excellent (if complex) conversion method in this PDF.

Northlight gives overviews of a number of techniques on this page.
mit some adjustments based on hue or saturation. More important is knowing the overall balance of skin coloration, and what you want to emphasis. For example, all 'races' have, in RGB, a predominantly red bias, and that's where the least variation will show. A larger red component will reduce the visibility of blemishes, while a larger blue will emphasize those blemishes. Green often works as a compromise, with 'enough' texture. (Much of this can be seen with a little experimentation using the Black and White Adjustment layers in CS3 or later, but even looking at the original Red, Green, and Blue channels can show this.)

To emphasize skin texture--older people for 'character'--I often start with the blue channel, and mix the others in to taste. To DE-emphasize skin texture--younger people (especially models)--I often start with Red, and add the others to taste.

Kevin you always have the best lists.

I also like to tone my black and whites slightly because plain jane neutral is boring.

- Phen
There is an exercise I like to have people do and thats try the "basic" 9 ways to convert to black and white on the same image and then have them print out a contact sheet to see which works best for them. Truly it goes image by image.

Leroy Dickson wrote:
Here's a tutorial I wrote a few years ago about various techniques.
http://www.dpchallenge.com/tutorial.php?TUTORIAL_ID=43

It doesn't include the B&W filter in CS3 or better.

?I also like Alien Skins Exposure, alot.

I use Alien Skin Exposure 2 for all my conversions.  The new grain and the recreation of all of my old film favorites(plusX125, Tmax 100 and 3200) takes the "digital" feeling out of the conversion process.

Kevin_Connery wrote:
Good ways?

Gradient Map.
Black-and-White conversion layer (CS3/4) It uses a mix of the Hue/Saturation stack and selective color approaches, but puts them together in a single easier to use package.
Hue/Saturation stack (described below)
Lab's L channel
Greg Gorman's approach. Tutorial on his website (See under Learn)
The Light's Right tutorial

An easy, and often satisfactory approach is Julianne Kost/Russell Brown's approach, which uses 2 Hue/Saturation layers: the upper one to remove saturation, and the lower to permit fine-tuning of individual color ranges. That plus a custom curve can be made very effective for batch operations. Russell's video explains how. (This appears to be the basis for the B/W Conversion adjustment in CS3, but that’s a guess.)

A PDF of the handout I use in class summarizes the above and some other techniques is also available. It has links to more elaborate explanations.

The most powerful is probably using Calculations on channels, building things up until they're where you want them, but it's not obvious or intuitive. (Here's one tutorial to get you started.)

Jeff Schewe explains an excellent (if complex) conversion method in this PDF.

And people say black and white is easy.

Click Hamilton wrote:
Asking for a b/w conversion technique is like asking for a retouch technique.


It depends on the photo and it varies widely.


Polishing off a b/w image uses lots of the same tools that polishing off any other image requires.


One thing I can say is that b/w is far more than simply taking the color out of an image.

This is the new "digital art and retouching" forum , I would expect more talk on technique than what I would get if I asked in "photography" forum.

Brian Ziff wrote:
you should never convert to black and white.  if an image is meant to be b&w, then desaturate it either in camera or traditionally and adjust everything afterwards...levels, highlights, shadows, whatever.

there is no "best" way.  there is just concept and final product.

If you shot RAW whats the diff?  That would make desaturating it in camera a moot issue wouldn't it?
What do you consider "traditionally"?

Kevin_Connery wrote:

Yes, if you're using digital, using Photoshop is probably best.

There are other programs out there none of which I would have been interested in learning how to work BW with.  Thats why I specified Photoshop.


Good links and reads thanks .

biwa wrote:
What works best using photoshop.
Also what considerations do you do for the different races ?

There are quite a few ways to go b/w in Photoshop.

As for different shades of skin, trial & error has worked for me. Individual results may vary.

Jack Dog Studio wrote:
Nik Silver Efex Pro.    Worth the money.  Great control and ability to add dimension/depth.  I've tried a bunch of the methods described here and they're good.  When it's crunch time and no time to play and experiment, you can't go wrong.   The key to Nik, and all techniques, is to start with the best color image.  Good BW becomes a piece of cake.

Personally I love my Silver Efex Pro.