This is one that I took in the winter just after I got this D40 camera. It shows the cooling towers of Fiddler's Ferry, a coal fired power station on the banks of the River Mersey not far from Liverpool.
My B&W processing skills have come on a lot since I first tried processing this one and I wanted to have another try to see if I could get any more out of it. Here's the original photo that I posted on 23rd December 2007 for anyone who is interested: http://ianbramham.aminus3.com/image/2007-12-23.html
Like what you see here and are interested in photographic composition?.....the blog section of my website now has a complete set of 5 articles covering my personal approach to the subject: Ian Bramham Photography - Blog
For purchasing high quality archival prints of any of these photos you can send me an email by clicking here or by going to my website Ian Bramham - Fine Art Photography where prices are listed in the gallery sections under each individual photo.
@Bob!: Thanks Bob....John Leech http://www.flickr.com/photos/leechypics/2506013865/in/set-72157594488063302/ showed me that this kind of thing was possible with B&W processing back when I got this camera but it's only recently that I've started to figure out basic things like layers, curves, dodging & burning etc which are essential to getting the most out of conversions from colour.
@Mirko Herzner: Thanks Mirko.....sometimes I find it really interesting to go back and take a look at some of my older photos and try and reprocess them. It can be revealing about the direction I'm heading in and the experience I've gained.
@MadScientist: Thanks mb!....it deserved a better sky didn't it. The key to improving the sky here was in saturating the colours before converting to B&W and only then applying contrast to bring out the different tones in what had previuosly been a rather flat expanse of cloud.
@Sharon: Hi Sharon....I hope you never get fed up with the skies in my photos (glad you liked it!)
@yz: Thanks yz...I appreciate it!
@Anthony: Thanks Anthony....my processing skills are slowly but steadily improving.
@Ian: Thanks Ian.....I haven't added or taken anything away in this version compared to the original. The 'improvement' has all come from using CS3 rather than Elements and better skills on my part in using contrast tools.
@Lorraine: Thanks Lorraine....photoshop has been a real struggle for me but now at least I can manage some of the basics.
@ordinaryimages: Ah well...can't win them all :-)
@IanSmith: Thanks Ian....just in the past month or so I finally feel like I've started to get somewhere with Photoshop. I know it's just a first step on a long road but at least I'm not struggling anymore with basic stuff like layers. Thanks again for setting me on the road with processing with all that help you gave at DPR Fujiforum.
@m a r t a: Thanks Marta!
@Daryl: Thanks Daryl!
@Lorena: Thanks Lorena....with my photography I tend to progress in a stop/start kind of way whereby I can suddenly feel like I've made real progress then things will stay at that level for quite a while before (hopefully) I make another bit of progress. It can be a very frustrating process.
@Nataly: Thanks Nataly....we've been lucky for dramatic skies this summer (or maybe it's just that this is my first summer with this DSLR and I'm looking at them a lot more this year :-)
@Ted: :-)...thanks Ted.....master class!....you've got a good sense of humour anyway!
@dj.tigersprout: Thanks dj!...you don't need classes from anybody. Your photos are great without needing tips from me. I'm a raw beginner when it comes to photoshop and it's something that I find far harder than the photography although I enjoy experimenting with it. The key for me with B&W processing was getting CS3 which also happened to coincide with me finally starting to use layers....those two things made a big difference to the subtelty and range of tones I was able to bring to my B&W photos.
On a more serious note though, if you ever feel there's something specific that you think I can help with I'll do my best to try and explain what I've done to get a particular result....this image for example was trickier than most. Normally I can get the tones in my B&W skies by just using the CS3 dedicated converter and then applying contrast with the 'curves' tool with perhaps some dodging & burning. With this photo however, the clouds were really flat and the CS3 converter didn't do much for it. A trick that sometimes works for me proved to be the key on this one....what I did was to really saturate the colours and push the colour temperature on the original photo so that the sky turned into shades of dull yellow before trying the CS3 converter again followed by 'curves'. The converter then had much more to work on with there being a greater range of tones in the yellow than in the previously uniform white clouds.
Have you got CS3 by the way?....for those who haven't it has an excellent B&W converter that has sliders for each of the main colours such as yellow, red, green, cyan, blue etc. What this does is allow a great deal of subtelty in the way each of those colours changes to monotone. The most common example of it in use would be a typical blue summer sky with some white clouds....with CS3 you can choose the blue and cyan sliders and alter that blue sky so that it is converted to any shade of white through to black that you like.
@Margie: Thanks Margie!
@Laurie: Thanks Laurie...yes I took this photo in the middle of winter!
@amy: Thanks Amy!....the post processing skills have been a lot harder to learn than the photography but at last I feel like I'm starting to get somewhere with it (at least it's not as deeply frustrating as it used to be:-)
@ZmAjEvA: Thanks ZmAjEvA!.....honestly I'm a beginner at Photoshop but at least I'm using layers now which is a big help.
@Lorraine: Lorraine, CS2 will certainly allow you to convert shots from B&W to colour but I think the dedicated converter that I've been using for my recent work is new on my CS3 version. I didn't own a copy of CS2 so I can't advise on the best methods with that version of Photoshop.
My previous software was Photoshop Elements 5 so I can help with that B&W converter....it is extremely easy and produces instant results but isn't quite as subtle as CS3 as the contrast is added as part of the conversion process....with CS3 it's a 2 step procedure - B&W conversion first and then add your own contrast after to your own taste rather than have it dictated to you by the programme.
@Marie: Thanks Marie!
@John Pendley: That's very kind of you John! I'm amazed that you managed to get this far back into my AM3 portfolio. I was very much a raw beginner back in 2007 when this particular photo was taken including this 2008 re-processed version. The main difference between 2007 and now in 2018 is that these days my digital post processing to b&w is very much governed by what I think will look good on a print. (PS I'm 58 next week and I too wish that I was 30 years younger!)
NIKON D40
1/250 second
F/11.0
ISO 200
30 mm (35mm equiv.)