How to Convert a Color Photo into a Black and White Ones - Part II: Challenging Ways.

Last week we studied two easy way to turn a color photo into a B&W one using Grayscale or Desaturation method. We saw that playing a little bit with adjustments can help to do a better job.

As a matter of fact there are many other ways to do the same.

Today I'll show you two other famous methods to turn color photos into black and white ones: the LAB color method and the Channel Mixer adjustment.

I called them Challenging Ways in the title but don't worry! They are not too complicated, they just needs some additional steps.

We'll start with the same photo as the "easy" article.

LAB Technique

Go to Image>Mode>Lab mode

L is for lightness and a and b for the color-opponent dimensions.

After converting the RGB in LAB mode go to the Channels palette or, if closed, open it clicking on Windows>Channels.

Select the Lightness channel and throw a and b away dragging them into the basket (you get the same thing if you select the lightness channel and convert the photo into grayscale again).

Click Ctrl+click on the gray channel so you automatically select some areas in the photo.

Go to Layers palette and create a new empty level.

Choose a dark color and fill the selection in with the color into the new level using the Paint Bucket Tool (G)

Deselect (Ctrl+D) and adjust the opacity of this level decreasing it.

Create a Curves adjustment level and play with the curve to give contrast to the photo.

Here the final result:

Channel Mixer Method

Open your image and go to Image>Adjustment>Channel Mixer.

Tick Monochrome. The channel percentages should theoretically add up to 100% (i.e. 70% Red + 20% Green + 10% Blue = 100%). More than 100% means lighter images and less than 100% means darker images.
Again 100% is a standard that gives you an image a little flat, without exceeding you can play with slight variation of the percentages.

This is the result:

Duplicating the level and playing with the blending methods (even more than one!) you can reach very good results. In the following picture, for example, I've applied an overlay blending mode and decreased the opacity to 30% to enrich the shadows.

This is the result with the overlay layer applied:

On addition you can download and use several really worthy plug-ins such as the Virtual Photographer Free Plug-in that I already reviewed here.

Other colleagues designers have produced and shared some actions that you can download and install in Photoshop. Launching them and the actions will do the converting job for you.
Unfortunately these actions are preset so you can't have the control on your image result. You just can try and see if they fit.

Compare the photo resulted from the today and last week tutorial:

How to Convert a Color Photo into a Black and White Ones - Part I: Easy Ways

There is absolutely not just a right way to convert a digital photo to black and white.
Everywhere you can found lists of plug-ins, methods or techniques applied to several graphic programs.
What's really matters is your personal approach to your photo, the result that you can already see into your mind and that you want to reach. You must remember that nothing works better than your taste.

Additionally you have to practice a lot. You don't have simply given up to your computer and let it decide how your photos have to look like.
Trying different technique, doing exercise, you will get the picture that you want.
With this basic point into our mind lets then to start and see different approaches to convert color images into black and white ones.

Two Easy Ways

In Photoshop there are two very easy options to do the job. They are easy but perhaps not the best solution.  I want to give you the tools but the choice about their use is up to you. We will see that those methods could be a good start that can be improved.
This is the colored image that we want to turn in B&W. It is a beautiful Baroque balcony in Lecce (Italy).

Easy Way One: the Grayscale Mode

Go to Image>Mode>Grayscale

This is the result:

Easy Way Two: Desaturation Method

Go to Image>Adjustments>Hue/Saturation and bring the Saturation slide to 0.

You get the same result looking for Hue/Saturation going to the adjustment palette.
This is the result:

Both methods are simple and direct but the converted image looks dull and flatten.
You can improve this result playing with the levels (Image>Adjustments>Levels) and giving more personality to the shot.

Another good way to enhance the result is to apply a B&W Gradient Map (Image>Adjustments>Gradient Map).

The Gradient Map Window appears.

Click the gradient preview to edit the gradient and the Gradient Editor Window appears.

Change the location relation between the black point and the white point moving the little circle between the two colors. you can also add a new gradient color in the middle. Here I've added a gray color.
This is the final result.

The  final photo looks much better with few simple actions.

Please don't miss the post: How to Convert a Color Photo into a Black and White Ones - Part II: Challenging Ways.
I'll post it next week.

For the time being compare the photos that we get today and choose your favorite method! ^_^