Friday, March 20, 2015

B&W February

black and white image of azaleas in bloom
Azaleas in Bloom, copyright 2015, Stephanie Maatta Smith
My online photography group participated in a photography book club during the month of February. We read Andrew S. Gibson's The Magic of Black & White Part 1 - Vision, and practiced making black and white photographs exclusively for the month, using his techniques and recommendations. The goal was to learn to "see" in monochrome, and to evaluate the effectiveness of color versus monochrome for impact. The take-away for me was learning how light changed an image when seeing it in color and then translating it to monochrome. This exercise also provided more opportunities to discover my camera's features and settings I normally don't use.

Black & White Collage, copyright 2015, Stephanie Maatta Smith

Stripping away color brought out the subtle details which might otherwise be missed, such as the glowing center of the tulips and the delicate lacing of the spider web. I also found, for me, simple composition is more effective than complex images.

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