I’ve been working on the black and white conversions some more, trying to understand how to mix color channels to alter the tonal balance in an image. It’s complex and I don’t feel I have all of the tools, but I’ve made some headway.
Time and time again I get to a certain point in post processing an image and I stare at the screen, blank as to what to do next. I’ll give up and upload the image to Flickr. Once I see the thumbnail, it becomes clear to me what the image needs to get to the next level. In this image, the wall at the left and the sidewalk had the same value. It became clear that the wall needed to be brought down and the sidewalk up in value.
I also used John Paul Capinigro’s colorization method on this image, using hue and saturation in PS CS3. It’s easier than the duo or tritone methods I’ve tried before and I think is a bit richer.
I took a short trip to the Boston area on business this past week, dragged the Lecia along and took no images. I’ll start some more extensive travel soon. Should I try the D80 or D300, shoot for black and white and use conversion? Or bring the Leica as usual?
Digital post processing offers almost unlimited variations for conversion of RGB captures to b&w, and essentially allows you to reinterpret tonal distribution according to your specific needs to a much more precise degree than with the methods employed with film development and printing.
In this photograph I also like the reflections on the window panes on the far side of the street–maybe those could be tonally separated to stand out more?