Color or black or white? I love b&w but find it easier to shoot color. Here's a quote from Ralph Gibson:

>...it's [color] not as emphatic as ...black and white...It's such >a goddamn challenge that now I seldom go with just one camera. >I carry two cameras and four lenses, and I keep one loaded with >color neg. I am getting more interested in it. I have a few >color pictures that reveal that it can be done in terms of what >I'm looking for and attempting to prove. Still, you can't ever >really get over that nostalgia. Black and white has an >incredible emotional dramatic effect that can't be so easily >abandoned.

And here's on from Mike Johnston, former editor of Camera and Darkroom and Photo Techniques:

>...I'll just say that I like color more than b&w...in other >people's work. I'd much rather _look_ at color; I think color >photographers are more innovative right now; and I think color >photographers are, in general, more important right now. >_Most_ of my favorite photographers these days (among people I >know) work in color. A color photographer is pretty much the thing to be.

I tend to agree with Mike Johston: there's more that one can do with color in terms of shooting pictures that are different from what other people might be dying, more possibilites for a different vision, for originality. Mainly because color has an additional dimension allowing the photographer to organize his or her image around color.

In my own case, I have a concept of what I want to do with color: I either want to explore out-of-focus areas (bokeh) both in front and in back of the plane of focus by shoot at the widest apertures; or I want to have the color in an image create an abstract form, creating a tension between the figurative base of the picture and to explore meaning through form, to abstract and reveal the underlying geometry. Unfortunately, I have no concept of what I want to do with b&w.

But, although I find color easier, one has to admit that some subjects are better in b&w than in color. For example, a few years ago at Angkok Vat, I shot both color and b&w. I printed none of the color pictures but had some very good b&w ones. While I travel, I tend to carry two cameras, one with color the other with b&w. That may be a mistake because I find that I tend to get better pictures when I carry only one camera and only or two lenses.

Here in a b&w picture shot with an Elmarit-M 28/2.8 probably at f/5.6 or f.8. Incidentally, I shot this on Kodacolor but printed in b&w, showing that some subjects are definitely better in b&w.

And here is one showing the type of thing I am interested in in color. This picture is more "difficult" to appreacite than the b&w one.

What do you think?

-- Mitch Alland/Bangkok (malland@mac.com), February 28, 2002

Answers

I prefer your colour image in b+w. In colour, the pinks at the top of the frame - but in the background - fight for my attention (also linking with the pinks at the front). In grayscale, and a little less contrasty (could just be my monitor) I find the image much more intriguing. Both pictures have obvious merits, BTW - I prefer the second, but as it stands, it's less perfect.

-- Steve Jones (stephenjjones@btopenworld.com), February 28, 2002.

You raise an issue that I've struggled with for several years & recently resolved. I have shifted from multiple films (XP2, Tri-X, Provia, etc etc) to shooting w/ Fuji NPH 400 exclusively (unless I'm doing something commercial--a wedding etc, that requires film that's customer driven). All my negs are digitized & then edited in PS6, so I can retain color, or shift to B&W, or duotone, as I wish. But by shooting color from the beginning, all the data's there, & then the image dictates the eventual appearance. I'm functioning more fully as an artist.

Another incredible advantage to abandoning traditional darkrooms.

-- Patrick (pg@patrickgarner.com), February 28, 2002.

This is off (or side thread) and a very basic question: With the fast lenses of the Leica world, how are folks shooting indoors with color, without flash, but avoiding yellow or orange cast pictures? Use of color correcting filters? I just ran some rolls of color indoors with my 35/1.4 asph, having shed my Nikon with flash, and having forgotten the color balance issue. How is this best dealth with (as against only shooting B+W indoors...)?

-- Bob Stevens (matlaw@hargray.com), February 28, 2002.

but can digital prints ever do justice to leica films?

can digital b/w prints rival traditional wet prints in terms of raw realism?

-- Travis koh (teckyy@hotmail.com), February 28, 2002.

I photograph exclusively in colour, but I have to say that it never occurs to me to somehow include the colour in the picture in a conscious way. The idea that colour is an extra variable to play with has never really clicked with me. I just find what I like in terms of stuff in the viewfinder and go click. It's all one big thing for me, not a set of components.

I'd be interested to know what you're trying to achieve with the second of these two pictures, Mitch. I have an idea, but I wouldn't presume. Do you think it's a successful picture?

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), February 28, 2002.

I use B&W exclusively for a number of reasons. I find that when I shoot in color I often tend to be swayed afterword by the color itself. I've kept images around for years because they had beautiful coloration, yet really weren't very good images. If find that in black and white I tend to concentrate more on the aesthetics of the image easier than with color. But this is such a subjective issue that there is no definitive answer. Ralph Gibson has been one of my favorite photographers for 20 years, and when he started publishing his color work I had reservations, yet find myself greatly admiring it. He doesn't let the colors overpower the image, like many do. A lousy shot of a flower in 'brilliant color' is still a lousy shot, yet has more chance of being thought good than the same lousy image in B&W. After all this I like your color image better!

-- Bob Todrick (bobtodrick@yahoo.com), February 28, 2002.

Patrick:

I have thought about shooting only in color and then deciding whether to print on color or b&w. But usually I shoot Ektachrome 100S which I find just doesn't have the "bite" in b&w that I get with Tri-X, Delta 100, or even Agfa Scala. Maybe color negs work better in B&W than chromes.

-- Mitch Alland/Bangkok (malland@mac.com), February 28, 2002.

Rob:

>I'd be interested to know what you're trying to achieve with the >second of these two pictures, Mitch. I have an idea, but I wouldn't presume. Do you >think it's a successful picture?

Hard for me to express in words, but has to do with the abstract structure of the colors. I guess you din't like it. It's related to what Eggleston does, or more precisely had more affinity to Huger Foote.

-- Mitch Alland/Bangkok (malland@mac.com), February 28, 2002.

Travis:

>but can digital prints ever do justice to leica films? >can digital b/w prints rival traditional wet prints in >terms of raw realism?

Have you seen Piezography prints. They can have a better gradation than lab prints. (Longer tonal range, particulalrly in the blacks).

-- Mitch Alland/Bangkok (malland@mac.com), February 28, 2002.

I do 90% of my color work by scanning slides and manipulating in photo shop the printing on an Epson 1280. The other 10% are done in Ilfochrome. For B&W I choose the appropriate b&w film for the application and develop myself to control contrast and grain, then print in a wet darkroom. I use variable contrast papers and can change contrast in specific parts of the print by dodging with magenta or yellow mylar, or by warming parts of a print with my fingers while its in the developer tray. I much prefer working in a darkroom where I get to move about then to sit in front of a computer. I personaly like the look of a silver print, but thats just my opinion.

Steve

-- Steve Belden (otterpond@adelphia.net), February 28, 2002.

I recognized the Eggleston allusion in your color shot right away, much like his plate of food in the diner or the picnic supper in "The Democratic Forest." Of the diner picture, Eudora Welty in her intro noted that it seemed to suggest a murder scene: "I've killed once and I will kill again!" An interesting proposition that food-stained dishes can be lurid.

All of that said, I would like to see something stranger in your shot: a different angle, a wider aperture from closer maybe so that the components are variously in and out of focus. It's not clear to me whether your food shot is supposed to be gross or appetizing. Eggleston declared his famous "war on the obvious" to allow him to inject strageness, even psychology, into mundane things that only slightly partake of the human realm.

I shoot black and white for documentary things, though I am interested in color but, as you might appreciate, I have no idea what I would want to do in color. I do like Eggleston's and Foote's examples. Jeff Spirer has some great color studies, too.

Your B&W shot is picturesque. Your color shot offers a greater challenge to you as a photog and us as viewers.

-- Preston Merchant (merchant@speakeasy.org), February 28, 2002.

Hi Mitch,

The food shot (brilliant but yukky, which, guess was your intend) could only be done in color; the landscape is lovely in b/w but might also be nice in color.

I love black and white but these days shoot almost entirely in color. Why? It is necessary for the project I've doing over the last 2 years. I've been shooting freaky young people in colorful clothes in Osaka with my Leicas. I tried b/w once in that scene and saw it was a major mistake. The color is the form and the content. So there you are.

I do not think there is anything like an ultimate answer to the pernnial philosophical question of whether the ideal platonic forms beyond time and space are in color or black and white. Only the particular, not the general, makes sense--at least to me. What feels right is right.

-- Alex Shishin (shishin@pp.iij4-u.or.jp), February 28, 2002.

I once read that to get a superb picture from color film you always have to keep in mind the color temperature of the light. I guess that's why pros fork over money for incident meters that can read color temperature and there are a plethora of warming/cooling gels on the market. I shoot both color and B&W but find that the B&W stuff I do is much better. With color not only am I worried about framing, composition, camera shake etc. but also, the interaction of each different layer of the film with the light source. One too many variables to be mindful of. Don't get me wrong... I have a great deal of respect for photographers who can shoot in color and get great results on their chromes but for me... the extra complexity in the process takes away from the spontaneity of my chosen style.

John.

-- John (ouroboros_2001@yahoo.com), February 28, 2002.

for me, personally, i prefer black and white. it is much easier to control the whole process from taking the picture to the final print. doing colour development yourself is just a pain...

-- stefan randlkofer (geesbert@yahoo.com), February 28, 2002.

-- Mitch Alland/Bangkok, I agree. Color negs have more "bite" than slide film. So if you went the direction I have where I now shoot only color, you'd have to be able to settle on a color stock that suited you. Provia & Velvia have even more "bite" w/ darker shadows (ie, less shadow detail & data) than NPH... the other extreme is Ektachrome. So this issue becomes, like everything, a matter of taste... --Travis, Digital work is every bit the equal of silver prints. Achieving those results though requires experience & sensitivity, just as achieving great darkroom prints requires years, often, of going through an inevitable learning curve. My sense is that often when you hear or read negative comments about digital images, the person making those comments has little experience in the new digital field. I was a decent darkroom worker, & when I shifted into digital work, I struggled, w/ great frustration, over about 18 mths, wondering if I were crazy to have abandoned my lovely chemicals and expensive enlargers. Now, I would never return, & remain thankful that I perservered.

-- Patrick (pg@patrickgarner.com), February 28, 2002.

Color elements have to be as carefully considered as any other element in composition. Or not.

-- John (johnfleetwood@hotmail.com), February 28, 2002.

Patrick:

>>I agree. Color negs have more "bite" than slide film.

The problem I have with scanning color neg film rather than slides is that with the color neg I don't have a reference for the color adjustment. It's hard to remember what the sceme was like in terms of color; or at least I don't have a good color memory.

-- Mitch Alland/Bangkok (malland@mac.com), February 28, 2002.

Perhaps one useful criterion for determining whether an image should be in monochrome or color is: What happens to the image if you take it away? Let's say I'm looking at a portrait and there is a chair in the background. Depending upon the individual image, removing the chair will either improve it or worsen it - the image cannot be equally good with and without the chair! Maybe the chair contributes something about the person's taste in furniture, which is illuminating to his personality, or the chair completes the compositional balance of the whole image. Or maybe the chair is a superfluous distraction, so removing it intensifies the image. The same could be said about color.

-- Ollie Steiner (violindevil@yahoo.com), February 28, 2002.

John:

>>I once read that to get a superb picture from color film you always have to keep in mind the color temperature of the light. I guess that's why pros fork over money for incident meters that can read color temperature and there are a plethora of warming/cooling gels on the market.

It doesn't have to be so complicated. Here's an example of mixing daylight and tungsten light. (Shot at flea market in Paris with Noctilux at f/1.0).

-- Mitch Alland/Bangkok (malland@mac.com), February 28, 2002.

The problem I have with scanning color neg film rather than slides is that with the color neg I don't have a reference for the color adjustment. It's hard to remember what the sceme was like in terms of color;

I never understand this type of comment. All films have a bias so that they don't really resemble the original color. It always seems to be far better to try and construct the colors in a way that you like in the same way that people choose film with specific bias.

-- Jeff Spirer (jeff@spirer.com), February 28, 2002.

Mitch, I personally don't think the colour one's a successful shot. Eggleston was the reference I had in mind. I think it doesn't work because it's sort of messy, unbalanced. This kind of thing is very difficult to do well, as I'm sure you're well aware. Personally I've always failed. When it's done well, it is sublime.

As to adjusting colour, the simple trick is to go by the numbers. Identify a part of the scan that should be white or grey and make it white or grey. At least that's how I do it, works pretty well most of the time.

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), February 28, 2002.

Rob:

>>I personally don't think the colour one's a successful shot. Eggleston was the reference I had in mind. I think it doesn't work because it's sort of messy, unbalanced.

You're probably right; but somehow there is something I like about it. Maybe its the idea of having some sort of order in a mess. I am not too sure about my feelings about this picture and therfore wanted to see the views I would get.

-- Mitch Alland/Bangkok (malland@mac.com), February 28, 2002.

It doesn't have to be so complicated.

I was drawing the distinction between stuff you do on the street and the studio stuff. If you look at some primo studio examples (like Ralph Barker's work) you can see where the capabilities of color film are maximized. Not so on the street... (its more hit-and-miss) especially if you want to be spontaneous. With B&W that variable is "largely" removed. Besides, its the subject that should dictate the choice of film/ medium. For most of my stuff B&W seems to do justice.

Regards,

John.

-- John (ouroboros_2001@yahoo.com), February 28, 2002.

Mitch,

I'm of the belief that there are several different ways to approach the color vs. B&W question. One, which I think you are using, is based on an idea of artistic exploration of the pure emotional impact of color in the scene, and what can be done with that color from an artistic perspective. Another approach is based on determining which medium best represents the content or message within the scene.

Starting with the latter technique, I like to go through a mental exercise of trying to determine what about a scene grabbed my attention in the first place - what motivated me to think about making a picture of it. If that source of inspiration/motivation is the interplay of color within the scene (an ovrlap or intrusion of the first technique), then color film is the obvious choice. If the motivating factor is more graphical or textural in nature, B&W may be the better choice.

To me, color also adds an element of realism with associated emotions, however. That element of the scene sometimes masks the appreciation of the message in the scene content. B&W abstracts out that color-based emotion and gets to the core of things. It's like the difference between a B&W artistic nude, and the same composition in color. B&W makes it easier to appreciate the beauty of line and form, and the dance between light and shadow.

In your food image, I'm more struck by the chaos of the table than by the interplay of colors, and find myself searching for a message in the food - why some has been eaten, while other dishes appear to be relatively untouched. Thus, I have mixed feelings about the objective of the image, and whether it succeeds at that objective.

John: thanks for the compliment on my work.

-- Ralph Barker (rbarker@pacbell.net), February 28, 2002.

In re-reading my comment (above), I see that I used the word "it" in a way that makes my meaning unclear. Here is the corrected version:

Perhaps one useful criterion for determining whether an image should be in monochrome or color is: What happens to a color image if you take away the color? Let's say I'm looking at a portrait and there is a chair in the background. Depending upon the individual image, removing the chair will either improve it or worsen it - the image cannot be equally good with and without the chair! Maybe the chair contributes something about the person's taste in furniture, which is illuminating to his personality, or the chair completes the compositional balance of the whole image. Or maybe the chair is a superfluous distraction, so removing it intensifies the image. The same could be said about having color or removing color.-Having color in the image cannot be equally as good as not having it. In looking at the scene to be photographed, the photographer should imagine it with and without color, in order to determine which of these contributes more to the INTEGRITY of the image.

-- Ollie Steiner (violindevil@yahoo.com), February 28, 2002.

What happens to a color image if you take away the color?

I thought this was an interesting question and looked at a few of my images. Interestingly enough, the color images I shoot don't translate well into black and white. I shoot very, very differently in color and black and white. Here's an interesting example, one that loses everything in black and white:

Copyright 2002 Jeff Spirer

-- Jeff Spirer (jeff@spirer.com), February 28, 2002.

Colour is always my preferred choice, though sometimes I feel like taking the odd B&W. I thiink that photogrpahy with colour is more difficult as colour temperature, artificial lighting and general colours can make or break a photograph. It is much easier to turn something simple to something intresting in B&W. Whereas colour is not always so easy. Shots made in B&W always seem to have a classic look, whereas colour photography, especially to someone like Salgado is "Too real"....end quote.

-- kristian (leicashot@hotmail.com), February 28, 2002.

Mitch, if you find that you shoot better with one camera and a couple of lenses you have answered your own question. Since I shoot for publication and never know whether it will be printed in color or black and white I am forced to shoot everything on color print film (usually Fuji Press 400 or 800). I think color film has incredible latitude and since I naturally see everything that has color in color, I concentrate on composition. I hate using flash but find that I must often use it to 'color correct' a situation or to add constrast that doesn't naturally occur. Under circumstances that don't allow flash and after manipulation in Photoshop doesn't render a color correction, I just leave a note for the editor to make sure to run on a black and white page. And finally, with color film you have a choice with your end product. With black and white fil

-- Dayton P. Strickland (daytonst@bellsouth.net), February 28, 2002.

..... With black and white film you don't.

(forgot to double space after end) *#@%&* 'puters.

-- Dayton P. Strickland (daytonst@bellsouth.net), March 01, 2002.