To get black & white shots, some people like to shoot in black and white or do the conversion in camera. I prefer to keep the colors in, and convert later. It’s easy to take away color, but difficult to put color back in.
There are actually 3 different ways to convert photos to black & white. All of them giving different results. I realized this after seeing the difference in print. The following are all done in Photoshop.
1. Mode > Greyscale
The most straight forward way to convert. On print it’ll look warmish, and blacks will look grey.
2. Image > Adjustment > Saturation > -100
Another method I used to use until i realize it kills subtle gradients in colored photos.
3. Gradient Map > Black & White Layer
To me the best method. Keeps the tonal range, blacks stay black, non-destructive because it has it’s own layer, and you can even reduce the opacity to adjust the amount of saturation.
I never tried gradient map le! interesting! next time can try!
Yes it’s very much better than the other 2 methods~