DNG Converting to Black and White

[crismitchell]

I have a quick and probably dumb question.

I really like the look of the in camera black and white jpgs of the M8. I'm shooting dng + bw jpg and would like to convert the dngs to black and white getting results that are close to what i'm getting with the jpg file.

Does anyone have any specific workflow instructions for converting dng to bw to get similar results to the in camera bw jpgs.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Cris...

 

[Doug]

Hi Cris -- Perhaps like you I started off with the M8 with the intention of doing black & white only. I've changed my mind. But I was pretty pleased with the camera-generated B&W JPEGs. AFAIK, you cannot convert the DNGs to B&W, but you can process them into B&W TIFF files. And there are many techniques and many programs that can do this in different ways, make the results look like various films, add grain, etc etc.

In doing this processing with CaptureOne, though, you can run the Saturation slider to -100, and work with the White Balance and Levels to change the relative greyscale tones to your satisfaction.

 

[rover]

i have been using this method for the dng files i convert to b&w

http://www.popphoto.com/Features/5-Steps-To-Convert-RAW-Files-To-B-W

 

[Santtu Määttänen]

My personal favorite is to use Lightzone, intuitive and easy and for some reason I seem to get better B&W results with it then with Photoshop, altho it doesn't do ANYTHING photoshop wouldn't. It's all about preference, style your looking for and learning curve you're willing to accept. I've been Photoshop user since version 5 and Lightzone user since free linux beta (now I'm regular user with mac version). So I've got the workflow I like by now, but when starting with something new, as always, play around, use different tools and see what you like and what's intuitive for you, then use it. With free trial software it's easy to experiment on what you like, oh check the price before you try it so that you don't get fixated with software you can't afford 🙂

 

[user237428934]

Silver Efex Pro is very good but not so cheap. If you have "only" Photoshop or Photoshop Element they offer a nice "Convert to greyscale" workflow too with a few presets and lots of options. Capture One also has some bw presets.

 

[dcsang]

I've got a pretty good (imo) photoshop action conversion that I'd be happy to share with everyone (sadly it's not here with me right now - but I can upload it tonight). I've adjusted it to do "warm", "cool" and "neutral" B&W's. I've actually shared it with and shown it to other photographers (wedding) and they prefer it over what I get out of Silver Efex.

I find that B&W conversion in digital is a very "personal" thing - what one person likes, another can't stand.

The difficult part, I find, is adding the right type of grain back into the image. As I have said before, grain, in film, has a more random pattern versus noise, in digital, which tends to be more orderly (for the lack of better phrasing).

Cheers,
Dave

 

[Babylon]

Hi Cris -- AFAIK, you cannot convert the DNGs to B&W, but you can process them into B&W TIFF files.

Yes, you can convert the DNGs to B&W and keep them as DNGs in the Lightroom workflow. LR makes a very good conversion, as good as Photoshop CS4 which is the one I use. I've also used Silver Efex Pro but I think the B&W converter of Photoshop is better because it respects better the subtetlies of the black and white.

 

[Doug]

Yes, you can convert the DNGs to B&W and keep them as DNGs in the Lightroom workflow...

Thanks for the info; in qualifying my statement I anticipated this surprising option. 🙂 Possible in Photoshop/ACR too?

 

[Peter S]

Dave, always interested in B+W conversion techniques. Could you lift a tip of the veil ?

At the moment I do my B+W conversion in Photoshop and the use Silverefex for finetuning and adding a light touch of grain. Still not happy with the grain part of things. I have been thinking of using a scanned zone V negative of my favorite films and then use a blend if layer technique to get more grain in the shadows and less in the highlights. Haven'tried it yet, how do you add grain ?

Chris, I think I once read about a wedding photographer using the B+W jpegs straight out of his M8 for his clients. So no complicated conversions etc. Seem to recall he did use a higher ISO setting to introduce a bit of noise/grain. I think he was called Brett and I might have read about it in the UK B+W Photography magazine (I will see if I can find it).