The Impact of Black and White

[Ben Chase]

I'm sure this topic has been discussed in the past, but I couldn't help but comment (perhaps on the obvious) about how different of an effect that something photographed in black and white has than something photographed in color.

With regard to landscape photography - there's Ansel Adams, and what more could one possibly say about that which hasn't already been said.

Recently, I was on a fishing outing with my my father, brother, and uncle for an entire week. Aside from the fact that putting 4 guys on a boat for a week with beer, scotch, and sarcasm is just asking for trouble - I noticed that almost all of the good portrait-style photographs I took of my family were with black and white film. I discarded almost everything I took in color.

Does this happen to anyone else when taking pictures of people? Portrait photos in B/W to me, tell a story that is significantly different than portrait photos taken in color. I'm not sure I can explain this very logically - it almost seems like the portraits taken in color are too distracting, taking away from what you're trying to show. With well-exposed black and white film, to me, it seems like there is no mystery about what the subject matter is, nor the story you're trying to tell with the photograph.

Does this make any sense to anyone, or have I lost my mind?

Ben C

[Capocheny]

Hi Ben,

I've seen GREAT images made in both mediums... color AND B&W.

However, some subjects may suit one medium over the other. Whether this is true or not will depend on personal tastes.

Some shooters use color film exclusively; others use B&W.

YMMV

Cheers

[John Kasaian]

WHile I agree with Capocheny, I also prefer B&W. I think B&W photographs have a certain dignity about them. Exactly why I feel this way is hard to put a finger on. A beautiful color landscape is indeed a glorious thing and a color portrait is far more life like, but B&W I think asks something from the viewer's imagination that color does not.

Maybe the elusive difference is a little like this:

Color is motion picture soundtrack of heroic scope in Dolby played by a symphony orchestra.

B&W is the wailing of an unseen saxman busking on a street corner a block away.

[domenico Foschi]

WHile I agree with Capocheny, I also prefer B&W. I think B&W photographs have a certain dignity about them. Exactly why I feel this way is hard to put a finger on. A beautiful color landscape is indeed a glorious thing and a color portrait is far more life like, but B&W I think asks something from the viewer's imagination that color does not.

Maybe the elusive difference is a little like this:

Color is motion picture soundtrack of heroic scope in Dolby played by a symphony orchestra.

B&W is the wailing of an unseen saxman busking on a street corner a block away.

Nicely put, John.

[John Kasaian]

Thank you, Domenico!

Cheers!

[Struan Gray]

For me, one problem is that 'colour' so often means LEGO colour: the spectral primaries of childrens' toys and learn-your-colours-and-numbers books. Red. Green. Blue. Yellow. It's so overused by commercial interests that it becomes hard to see or use with any subtlety.

I like, and have been trying to make, photographs that use what I think of as a secondary palette. Purples, aquamarines and that greeny-yellow you get as leaves just start to turn. Josef Albers got there a long time ago, but it's interesting how little the photographic world has chosen to follow him.

That said, in today's colour-saturated world B+W seems to have a sense of authority with laypeople that colour lacks. When I show non-photographers my prints they are much more ready to take the monochrome ones seriously as acts of creation. Colour shots are appreciated, but my role is relegated to that of an observer. I can live with the shame.

[Doug Howk]

Its like Judy Garland's Wizard of Oz: reality is the B&W (or actually sepia toned) portions whereas color is the fantasyland. If you want to see the essence of a subject - its reality, view a Weston print. Color is the Madison Avenue, camouflaged version of a subject seen in magazine ads.

[Bill_1856]

Exceptional Color is much more difficult to make than B&W. Don't knock it if you can't do it.

[Ted Harris]

Lot's of good points. I am especially taken by Struan's. Those of us, like Struan and I, that live in the 'frozen North, are often presented with hauntingly beautiful images in the secondary palette. Often images that approach monochromatic with the exception of a small spot or blush of color, usually a subtle pastel, in the image. Difficult, very difficult to capture and outstanding when done well.

At the opposite end of the spectrum are images which use strong color to convey meaning. The examples that come most readily to mind are many of Chris Jordan's images. Chris .... are you reading ... want to chime in here?

[Robert McClure]

Ben,

For me, black & white gets at essence of a scene. Color can tend to inform me of what is there (in a photograph), but thus saves me the trouble of more deeply experiencing something of the nature of the raw material in a scene. Black & white can to redeem the plastic beauty of the material that is really there. Some might say that the truth or the real beauty lies in the plasticity. If I am going to choose a particular piece of reality to pull out of its context to then examine, I prefer that it be boiled down to essence, to simplest elements, for purposes of that examination.

All of those very subjective comments made, I have seen color work where color is "used" carefully or sparingly. The result, for me, is that the color of the material and the material itself emerge in their (more or less) essence. I mean, color is also worth exploring.

A full color scene with a lot of color and photographed, more or less, naturally, strikes some as "garish" (which I think was the word Walker Evans used to describe any color photography). Evans and others, I think, have gotten so used to solely black & white that, for them, it's like being used to the subtle sweetness of fresh broccoli and then eating a Hershey Bar.

I don't mind chocolate bars. It's just that I am, by nature, an explorer and discoverer. Boiling down an image to shades of gray, for me, allows me to do exploration far more easily. Beauty, also then, can seem to more easily emerge.

Robert McClure