Why 256 shades of grey

The image was destroyed as he attempted to make copies of it, but when he tried again, he managed to produce a black-and-white image of a window. It was an inauspicious beginning for a form of media that has fascinated people ever since. Even after Kodachrome was launched in , black-and-white photography did not become obsolete. As colour photography improved, black and white was used less, but it has persisted for its ability to convey sophistication, timelessness, mood, and emotion, as well as its aesthetic appeal.

Ansel Adams, an environmentalist ahead of his time, documented the Wild West of old America in black and white. Diane Arbus documented people outside the norm in black and white.

Henri Cartier-Bresson, who was considered to be the father of modern photojournalism and was one of the first photographers to use the new 35mm format for candid photography, shot in black and white. Robert Capa captured his famous real-life moments of people in crisis across five wars in black and white. Richard Avedon defined the style, beauty, and culture of the US during the 20th century in black and white.

A new cohort of photographers is discovering the aesthetics and emotive power of black-and-white photography and a renaissance is blossoming throughout the world. Adrian Cook has carved out a unique market for his work with tintypes, so black and white is his main option.

He does, however, say that he came to black and white purely out of preference and a desire for distinctiveness, which is linked to his decision to shoot as much as possible with film. Only the photographer, his assistant, and the lab knew how each photographer did what they did. Sydney-based advertising specialist, Christopher Ireland shoots with black-and-white film simply because he thinks it is the most beautiful and elemental form of photography.

Seeing an image slowly reveal itself from the developing bath is almost spiritual. For Ireland, the beauty of black and white is that it can be classical and straightforward. I process everything in our laundry. It slows me down. It gives me a physical medium to work with. It inspires me. It connects me to the lineage of wonderful photographers who have gone before.

It also leaves a family legacy, because I mainly shoot the immediate family and I convey my love to them through the emotional images we create together. Melissa Breyer, a street photographer based in New York, appreciates its aesthetics. Colour screams for attention and can sometimes steal the show, while black and white sits more quietly and lets the content and composition do the work.

Many people shoot in black and white when deciding to become photographers. There are too many menu variations between manufacturers and camera models to list them all here, but if the following links should help you find how to switch your histograms on.

Or, you should find your camera's settings by Googling your camera make and model, and the word "histogram". Panasonic Lumix. One thing you may notice, especially if you shoot raw, is that the histogram you see in your camera is not the same as the one you see when you upload it to your favorite editing program. The reason being is that these programs generate their own unique preview of the raw file.

The applied default settings are, consequently, different from the ones added by your camera, which is embedded in the raw file. In fact, if you have an array of editing suites on your computer, you may find that the default histogram for the same photo is different in every one of them.

You will notice that there are two types of histogram available to you. The first includes colors, and so you can see the luminance of the Red, Green, and Blue Channels. The second is simpler, just showing the overall brightness of the entire image. For most types of photography, the latter has all the information we need.

Your camera will also have highlights and shadows warnings. Sometimes called zebras, these show pure whites and pure blacks as a flashing colored overlay in your image. Most photographers want to avoid blown highlights, as they are irrecoverable in developing. Similarly, black areas in the photo can also lose their details. These warnings are available in most raw developing tools too. Open a photo in your editing software and look at its histogram.

Slide the exposure up and down and see what happens to it as the image gets brighter and darker. Next, try the contrast slider. Increase the contrast to maximum and not how the histogram is stretched. Then decrease the contrast and watch the histogram get pushed together. Try the other sliders too, to see how they affect the image and the histogram. I hope you enjoyed this brief introduction to histograms.

Please let me know if you have yours switched on in your camera, and feel free to ask questions, and I'll try to answer them. Ivor Rackham earns a living as a photographer, website developer and copywriter, currently based in the North East of England. Much of his photography work is training others; helping people become better photographers. He has a special interest in supporting people with their mental wellbeing through photography. Check out the Fstoppers Store for in-depth tutorials from some of the best instructors in the business.

Thanks, Ivor. It may be worth mentioning that the RGB-histogram depends on the white balance of the camera. So if one changes the WB in post, the histogram may look very differently, especially on the right side of it.

I take pictures of dance performances where the light changes quickly and dramatically from the deepest blue to the brightest red. And it happens, that one side of the stage is blueish while the other side is reddish from orange to red.

Those RGB-histograms sometimes look very weird and if one changes the white balance of such an image, one of the colours generally blows out very fast. Great point, Jan. Thanks for that. Super picture too. That must be quite a challenge shooting images under coloured stage lighting.

I find purple lighting the most difficult to cope with. I use 'darktable'. The "new" scene-referred instead of display-referred module allows full RGB and not Lab only manipulation of the colour space of the image. I am still very impressed of Nikon's JPG-engine, which produces great images.

Although most of the photographers do use LR, this information here puts a light on how the conversion from RAW to a displayable image is done best. The above image has shades of gray. Like this: Like Loading View all posts by radiologypics ». Leave a Reply Cancel reply Enter your comment here Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:.

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