Black and White Photography, Part 3

 

Its time to wrap up this multipart article. What better way to that than to end it with some monochrome photo's from my last trip to Turkey Run State Park. But first the tea of the day.

 

 

These first two photo's show another example of what did not work well in monochrome. The bule sky behind the birds in the color photo looks very beautiful. But in monochrome it looks very dull.

 

 

 

This set of photo's I like both in monochrome and color, There is enough variance in light, shade and texture to make the monochrome photo look nice. The lose of the bright green from the color does not harm the monochrome photo.

 

 

These next two photo's are equally uninteresting. I was trying to capture the imposing nature of these rock formations. As always when I have tried this I have I failed. I have read somewhere that zoom lens's will "flatten" an image. I have never been sure what this meant. Maybe that is what they were talking about. The depth of the photo has been flattened out making the rocks seem smaller and less imposing than they were in real life. Next time I will try shooting with my 50mm prime lens. That might keep the image from being flattened. Also I recently purchased an adaprer that makes regular len's into Wide Angle lens's. Since it only cost $12.00 I am sure it won't make a big diference but maybe it will help. That adapter and a couple of macro adapters will the subject of a future article.

 

 

 

I will end this article with my two favorite photo's from this trip. I think the monochrome and color photo worked well. The lines of the wooden bridge and the curves of the suspension wires lead the eye down the path. It would have been better if the shadow had not been cast on the wooden part of the bridge and the background foliage is a little too dark. But I still enjoy the photos

 

 

Well what I have learned about monochrome photography is that I need to avoid broad area's of a single color like a blue sky or brown river water. What seems to make a beter monochrome photo is area's of contrasting light levels and textures. These things draw more attention in monochrome photo.

I now have another tool I need to keep in mind during my photograpgy sessions.