1 We have a couple of example images we are going to
convert to black and white using a number of methods
including Lightroom itself, some presets and going further afield
by using Lightroom in conjunction with a compatible plugin
that is a dedicated black and white conversion program.
3
A look at the Histogram in the top right corner of the
Lightroom workspace will confirm this. The right side of
the histogram represents the spread of the lightest tones, whilst
the left side shows the distribution of the darker tones. It shows
a small amount lost to underexposure but nothing drastic.
4 People choose to edit their images in different ways but
we tend to get the image looking as balanced as possible
in its colour state before switching to black and white. The first
thing we did was to change the White Balance to Daylight to
accurately portray colour as our starting point.5
Next, there came a series of edits done in the Basic panel
to balance the image as much as possible. Highlights were
set at -85 to darken the highlight areas and increase as much
visible detail in the sky as possible and the White value was
dropped to -30 for the same reason.6
Then it was a case of boosting Shadows to +45 and Blacks
to +15 to make sure nothing was solid black in the image
which can potentially decrease detail. In the Presence panel, the
Clarity can be boosted to +40 for more mid-tone contrast. Do
not worry about Vibrance and Saturation at this point.2
It begins with a simple landscape photo of a tree and
fields taken on a crisp clear day. It is reasonably well
balanced, certainly the sky is not too overexposed and there is
still detail in the shadows, even in its unprocessed Raw state.
This is a good starting point for the conversion.
http://www.bdmpublications.com 141BLACK AND WHITE PROCESSING