My Favorite Products for B&w Photography

Go-to software and apps to help you make it monochrome.

- Joe Farace

“Everything looks worse in black and white.”—Paul Simon, the original lyrics to “Kodachrome”

PROVING YOU CAN, IN FACT, change your tune; Paul Simon revised the lyrics to “Kodachrome” when performing the song in Central Park in 1991 to “everything looks better in black and white.” Picky photographers insist “monochrome” is more precise because it covers images made using sepia, blue, or other tones, while images using only shades of gray are black and white.

To get out of a rut I like to shoot images in direct monochrome. I set the camera for Raw+JPEG capture and then select Monochrome mode, which provides an in-camera preview of what the image will look like in black and white. When using this technique with mirrorless cameras the EVF lets you view the image in black and white. Some dual-slot cameras, like the Pentax K-1 I recently tested (see my review on page 40), let you simultaneously save each file type onto a different card.

The Raw+JPEG technique is useful when making portraits because you can show the subject a black-and-white photograph on the LCD screen even though you’re capturing a color file that can be later processed into monochrome. Why? Because there are more tones available, most portrait retouching software, even Photoshop, works better with color files. Only after retouching do you convert the image to black and white. Back in the film days, darkroom gurus jealously guarded their film processing formulae and nowadays you’re just as likely to hear their digital descendants raving about different products for converting color files into monochrome and everybody has their favorites. The following are a few of mine.

SILVERY EFFECTS