Doing only B&W photography in order to learn??

[milosh]

Hello everyone,

I was wondering, did anyone of you ever do (or consider doing) only black & white photography (while you were starting out of course) in order to learn better?

This is my reasoning: if you look at elements of design and composition, you have lines, curves, shapes, forms, textures and colour.

I am thinking that if someone shoots only in B&W, that will force him to pay more attention to these other elements of composition. And later you can come back to shooting colour. Because we need to utilise all of them in our images.

It's like that saying: "Bad weather makes for good photographs.", because it forces us to pay more attention on these other elements.
This would of course require one to shoot B&W in camera.

I would just like to see your opinions on this.
Thanks

[AndCity]

Totally agree with you! I often wonder if it's best to shoot in colour then convert or shoot straight b&w. I have had conflicting advice on this but think, like you, shooting in b&w would help you compose the shot better.

I started off shooting b&w years ago only because I couldn't develop colour!

[milosh]

Well, I think that in order to learn composition it would be a must to shoot b&w in camera, because it would allow you to compose without colour interfering. If a certain scene could end up being an awesome pic. you could also take it in colour.

[zona5101]

Originally Posted by milosh

Hello everyone,

I was wondering, did anyone of you ever do (or consider doing) only black & white photography (while you were starting out of course) in order to learn better?

This is my reasoning: if you look at elements of design and composition, you have lines, curves, shapes, forms, textures and colour.

I am thinking that if someone shoots only in B&W, that will force him to pay more attention to these other elements of composition. And later you can come back to shooting colour. Because we need to utilise all of them in our images.

It's like that saying: "Bad weather makes for good photographs.", because it forces us to pay more attention on these other elements.
This would of course require one to shoot B&W in camera.

I would just like to see your opinions on this.
Thanks

Interesting idea. Why not go the distance and shoot with tri-x and a pentax k1000? Then not only do you have to pay attention to all the elements you mention, you only get one shot to get the exposure and composition right....and you won't know it until much after the photo is taken. Take it a step further and develop the film & prints yourself - lots of attention to detail in the darkroom. (Actually the way people are giving away 21/4 cameras, might want to do it in medium format then you get even less exposures per roll. It will teach you to be very selective when you push the shutter release.) And bonus you can play the suffering artist card!

[cphoniball]

I'm with zona. Shoot b/w film for a bit.

Which reminds me that I need to shoot b/w film more....

[Doug Pardee]

Originally Posted by milosh

did anyone of you ever do (or consider doing) only black & white photography (while you were starting out of course) in order to learn better?

Not to learn better, but because color film and processing was a ton more expensive back then.

I am thinking that if someone shoots only in B&W, that will force him to pay more attention to these other elements of composition. And later you can come back to shooting colour.

Composition for B&W and for color tend to be different. Certainly there are many things that you can learn from shooting B&W, but maybe half of those things are specific to B&W. Once you introduce color, a bunch of the rules change. Areas are generally defined by color rather than by tone, and blown highlights and blocked shadows are usually considered to be undesirable in color.

You might want to pick up Michael Freeman's book "The Photographer's Eye: Composition and Design for Better Digital Photos" (not to be confused with the classic book "The Photographer's Eye" by John Szarkowski). This is not a "how to" book; it's a discussion of the various compositional aspects and how they play into our visual perception.

This would of course require one to shoot B&W in camera.

The problem is that in-camera B&W tends to be poorly implemented. B&W is fundamentally about tonal differences, and the camera processor tends to have a heavy-handed and uncontrollable tone curve. Many cameras can shoot Raw+B&W JPEG, and that gives you a B&W preview along with a Raw file that you can convert to B&W to get the tonal effects that you want. (I use LightZone for the latter, although it's terribly slow).

[photog1107]

Having earned my notches by shooting full manual on a Nikon FE, black and white film, and then doing my own darkroom work... decades ago, (I can still remember the smell of those Ilford chemicals...mmmm stop bath....) I can faithfully attest that provided the best discipline and education for all that came after!

[milosh]

Originally Posted by zona5101

Interesting idea. Why not go the distance and shoot with tri-x and a pentax k1000? Then not ...

Sorry but your sarcasm doesn't make any sense.

Thanks for your comments Doug and photog1107..

Doug, I never really knew about the differences in composition in b&w and colour photography, thanks for pointing that out. I guess then it wouldn't be as useful as I thought it would. I'll try to find that book, I've already heard about it.
My idea was to use in camera b&w to help visualize in b&w, but I kinda forgot that with dSLRs you see what the lens sees while composing.

[PowerPix]

Originally Posted by milosh

Hello everyone,

I was wondering, did anyone of you ever do (or consider doing) only black & white photography (while you were starting out of course) in order to learn better?

This is my reasoning: if you look at elements of design and composition, you have lines, curves, shapes, forms, textures and colour.

I am thinking that if someone shoots only in B&W, that will force him to pay more attention to these other elements of composition. And later you can come back to shooting colour. Because we need to utilise all of them in our images.

It's like that saying: "Bad weather makes for good photographs.", because it forces us to pay more attention on these other elements.
This would of course require one to shoot B&W in camera.

I would just like to see your opinions on this.
Thanks

Hmmmm, this sounds extremely close to a post I made in a thread the past couple of days..........you stalking me???

[candleman]

i'm shooting b/w film ....

prettymuch only for the reason of forcing me to think more carefuly about the image and making it "right"... before pushing the button.

also.. b/w film has far better tones than bw digital.. IMHO