Why there is "Magic" in B&W?

[jamsus]

Hi everyone, i'm sick, at home... so i will open this thread for a bit of discussion.

Why there is still a lot of magic, sometimes also a lot of great mood, in black and white pictures?

What is, in your opinion, the secret behind a B&W picture?
Is a B&W picture just like a book? That let you imagine colors and other emotional-related things on the scene?
Or is just because we are all a bit nostalgic? The colors are a bit distracting? The eyes are more sensible to contrast than to colors?

Lets... discuss, i'm curious!

[HDNitehawk]

Nostalgia, many of us grew up playing in a dark room. We used B&W because of the expense of color and we could develop ourselves.

In today's world I discount a pic in B&W unless I see the reason. It is used as a crutch sometimes to fix color defects.

[jrw]

Stripping away colour leaves line, shape, contrast, and tone. To have a successful image it must be well executed. To help with composition take some of your better colour images, convert to B&W, and see how many of them rely on colour to do the heavy lifting. Still do this as a regular exercise to aid in seeing past pretty sunset colours, just an example, and find more interesting subject matter to make for a much stronger image that includes the sunset colours as part of it.

[Dave Throgmartin]

I really like B&W. It accentuates shapes and patterns. It works great for vintage or architecture type scenes too. It's great for "black glass" images with 8+ stop ND filters to show the great effect minus the color cast that can sometimes effect those images. It can be nice for portraits and is often the preferred format for busy street shots.

I think one's opinion of B&W is certainly impacted by age. I'm 34 and suspect Jamsus is likely a bit younger than me. Assuming I am right, neither of us grew up with black and white, but still enjoy the photographs. Nostalgia isn't the reason why for me. Sometimes the images speak to you in B&W when they don't in color.

I think sometimes on gear oriented forums like this, one can get so caught up in using high end equipment to try and take the technically perfect photograph that the art side can be lost.

Dave

[Kayaker72]

Maybe a bit odd, but this question made me think of those restaurants where you dine in the dark. Supposedly depriving you of one of your senses makes you focus more on your other senses which ends up accentuating the smell and flavor of the food.

Whatever. I have never done it myself. But the general concept of addition by subtraction may still apply.

To me, the answer is simple. You start with your basic image with full color. Then there are any number of steps that a photographer can take to emphasize their vision for the image. You can saturate colors, use warm color temps, cool color temps, you can sharpen, accentuate a single color, add vignetting, or modify contrast. You can also convert to B&W. All of these steps are toward an artistic vision rather than a simple picture, something we see in everyday life.

B&W, at least the renderings I like, do at least two things:

1. Makes you focus on the contrast or tonality within an image. With a color image you have to worry about the tonal gradient of each color, not just B&W.
2. I think the net effect is that this simplifies an image. Sometimes you can get lost in or distracted by all the color. B&W feels more simple, clear, sometimes more stark, or perhaps a little more true. But it does have a feeling too it.

I think the first bullet is what is technically going on, but the second step, if you are looking for "magic," may be the source.

[jerrytech1]

In my opinion…
B&W images provide a break from the sensory overload that is today's world…everywhere you look you are bombarded with bright colored lights. Billboards, TV, even our "phones" are blinking and demanding your brain process huge amounts of information. Viewing a nice B&W image , whether it be your own creation or not, can bring a sense of calm and act as a reminder of simpler times…life these days is extremely complicated. Photography itself is therapeutic and B&W is the most sincere form….

[sambisu]

To me, eliminating color gets rid of a distracting element and let's you focus on the subject matter better. In Bruce Barnbaum's book he says that color should only be included if it specifically adds something to the image (or something along those lines). I tend to agree and find many images that I feel are much stronger in B&W.

What drives me crazy is when I do a portrait and feel it is stronger in B&W but as soon as the subject sees it, they ask if I could give it to them in color.

[Zach]

In my opinion…
B&W images provide a break from the sensory overload that is today's world…everywhere you look you are bombarded with bright colored lights. Billboards, TV, even our "phones" are blinking and demanding your brain process huge amounts of information. Viewing a nice B&W image , whether it be your own creation or not, can bring a sense of calm and act as a reminder of simpler times…life these days is extremely complicated. Photography itself is therapeutic and B&W is the most sincere form….

couldn't have said it better myself!

[jamsus]

Thanks to everyone for the opinions, it is interesting to see how basically I agree pretty with everyone

When i got a free moment i'll explain also my point of view.