Black & White Shots

I don't know if anyone here shoots in B&W at all, but I thought I'd start a thread to see. I use 35mm film. My main subjects are trees and nature, and street photography, which I have recently got into. Here's a few of my street shots.

Nice! I like "Meet Drink Play" with the lone gentleman who is not doing any of those things.

Cool. :thumb:
I find with the B&W photographs I look at details because there is no bright colors drawing me away from them.

Good ones and good thread to start :)


There was a show of street photography in London some years ago which got me into that field. Not B+W though.

I dabbled in darkroom work before that though. Here is my favourite, still on my wall.
[ATTACH]66934[/ATTACH]


I changed to digital since then, only rarely shooting in B+W. This is one of them from last autumn shot in B+W (not changed in post processing)
[ATTACH]66935[/ATTACH]

I'd call the first one Flight of Fantasy.
The second was accidental as you were just holding the camera so they wouldn't suspect you were looking up skirts. tsk tsk

Thanks for the comments guys. Scriveyn two great shots there, very clean and lovely tones and contrast in both of them. Are they medium format or 35mm?

Thanks Squawk, the first one is 35mm, 15 ASA IIRC,the second one is from a digital camera (Canon 80D, crop sensor).

Undertoad;1029267 wrote:

Nice! I like "Meet Drink Play" with the lone gentleman who is not doing any of those things.

He's on his way home.

To drink, and play with his meat.

Whut?:eyebrow:

First one was shot digitally and I did the b&w thing in editing:

[ATTACH]66986[/ATTACH]

This one is an old scan of a paper pic that I turned b&w (well, sepia-toned, anyway) w/editing:

[ATTACH]66987[/ATTACH]

I took a photography course in junior college and loved working in B&W. As Bruce noted, my eye is definitely drawn to the typically invisible details of shading and light play when there is no color to distract my attention.

Nice work, everyone!

Some pictures can be decolored if they're sharp enough. It helps to think B&W when you're shooting, if you know what I mean.

Most (of mine anyway) b&w pics made from color digital need work in the contrast and sharpness. If ya want the pic to look old ya gotta knock off some of the sharpness.

Sometimes I'll add film grain, too.

"If ya want the pic to look old ya gotta knock off some of the sharpness."
Frank Hurley's photographs of the Endurance expedition seem to be an exception.
I have been in awe of his work for years. Some of the glass negatives spent time underwater.
http://humbermuseums.com/warrior-camera-frank-hurley/

Here's three of my tree shots. The first was in my local park, the second St James Park in London on the edge of The Mall which leads up to Buckingham Palace, and the third I think I took in a woods in Normandy when I was visiting a friend there. That one looks to me more like a painting for some reason, maybe because of its' high contrast.

I don't envy the London crew who have to clean up after those Sycamore trees.

I think those Sycamore trees are Plane trees, but their botanical history is about as messy they are.

Well I'll be damned, the Sycamore and the Plane tree are not related. I wonder if we have Plane trees over here and I just assumed they were Sycamores.
And the Sycamore is a Maple! I think I need to lie down. :smack:

We saw some big Sycamores at the Trexler Nature Reserve over the weekend but I brought neither camera nor phone so trust me.

Nice pics!

I read somewhere years ago that a London plane tree is a cross between a maple and a sycamore. And that sycamores and maples are related. Was I misinformed?

glatt;1029947 wrote:

I read somewhere years ago that a London plane tree is a cross between a maple and a sycamore. And that sycamores and maples are related. Was I misinformed?

Sycamores are maples, which are the Acer genus, whereas Planes are the genus Platanus, so they are not directly related. Also if you go up to the Family name they are different, Planes are the Platanaceae Family, maples are the Aceraceae Family.

From my copy of Collins British Trees:

Thank you!

That looks like a maple leaf.