Thursday, October 12, 2006

film-like digital black and white


My previous techniques in black and white conversion is not at all simple and easy as I have previously discussed. And as time goes by, we discover ways of improving our photoshop skills and I just discovered another photoshop way of approximating the film-like contrast of a black and white print from a black and white film where the blacks and the greys seem to be sharper.
The simplest way is not always the best way but if we can simplify our work flow with the least steps and at the same time achieving a desired effect, then, it is an effective way! Black and White conversion using the Channel Mixer is a very tedious trial and error of mixing and sliding the red, green and blue channel. An improvement which susbequently caught my attention is by using the Highlight/Shadow Adjustment Layer after the desaturation step but still, it didn't get the desired film-like effect, much more the simplicity i've been looking for.
I found a new b&w conversion technique in the CMYK Color Mode with the least complications thus far. Open your image, go to CMYK Color Mode, desaturate your image, then create a curve adjustment layer where you only have to push up the Black curve to increase the contrast and darken the grays into blacks!! as simple as that!! You can also add a tint of color by tinkering with the individual Cyan, Magenta and Yellow curves. Adding some film grain will further enhance your black and white images but for now, i'm satisfied with my new found conversion technique.

Many thanks to Jorgette for the modelling efforts...

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

salamat again for the technique