From Oz to Kansas: Almost Every Black and White Conversion Technique Known to Man

From Oz to Kansas: Almost Every Black and White Conversion Technique Known to Man

by Vincent Versace
Released August 2012
Publisher(s): New Riders
ISBN: 9780132838085

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Book description

The ability to create a stunning black and white image remains one of photography’s greatest and most aspirational skills. Being able to "see" in black and white is an enviable capability, and a well-crafted black and white photograph remains the finest of the fine arts. Master photographer Vincent Versace has spent his career teaching the art of perception and how to translate it into extraordinary black and white images.

In From Oz to Kansas: Almost Every Black and White Conversion Technique Known to Man, Versace discusses digital black and white photography – with a nod to traditional film-based techniques. As Versace states, today the goal is "to use what was right and good about silver photography, leaving behind what was limiting, and use what is right and good about digital photography, while avoiding its pitfalls. This is what this book is all about."

The reason you must learn "almost every black and white conversion technique known to man" is because, depending on the image – and your goals for it –t here are many paths you can take in order to arrive at your final destination. Working through Versace’s techniques will give you the essential knowledge you need, as well as the ability to select the appropriate conversion technique for any image, allowing you to create a black and white image that best and most accurately reflects what you felt at the moment that you pressed the shutter.

Foreword by Dr. Richard Zakia, Professor Emeritus, Rochester Institute of Technology

Afterword by John Fraser, Chef and Proprietor, Dovetail Restaurant, New York

Table of contents

  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Page
  3. Dedication Page
  4. Acknowledgements
  5. Contents
  6. Foreword
  7. Preface: About Beginnings & the Scope of This Book
    1. What This Book Is Not
    2. What This Book Is
  8. First Words: The Pleasure of Creativity
    1. Why Create?
    2. Hardening of the Categories
    3. If You Have a Minute, Tell Me Everything You Know
    4. From Imperfection Perfection Grows
    5. Traveling at the Speed of Life
    6. Memorizing a Dictionary Does Not Mean You Have Something To Say
    7. Home Run Hitting 101
  9. Chapter 1. The Black and White on All of the Gray Areas of Black and White
    1. Coming to Terms
    2. Desaturation: Why You Should Not
    3. Desaturation: When You Should
    4. Believing Is Seeing: The Way the Eye “Sees” What it Saw
  10. Chapter 2. Variations on a Theme
    1. Film and Filter: Three Approaches
    2. Approach One: The Classic Film and Filter
    3. Approach Two: Neo-Classic Film and Filter
    4. Approach Three: Neo-Neo-Classic Film and Filter–Yet Another Variation on a Theme
    5. Why Knowing This Matters
  11. Chapter 3. Defying Logic
    1. The Camera & the RAW File
    2. In Camera Conversion
    3. In RAW Processor Conversions
    4. To Begin the Beguine
    5. Conclusion
  12. Chapter 4. Defying Reason
    1. The Black and White on Convert to Grayscale
    2. The Black and White on Split Channel Conversions
    3. The Black and White on Lab Color Space Conversions
    4. The Black and White on Equalizing Lab
    5. The Bottom Line
  13. Chapter 5. Somewhere Over the Grayscale
    1. The Black & White Adjustment Layer Basics
    2. The Black and White on Using the Black & White Adjustment for Color
    3. Conclusion
  14. Chapter 6. The Black and White on the Zone System
    1. Zoning in on the Zone System
    2. What You See Is What Will Take You
  15. Chapter 7. The Black and White on the Channel Mixer Adjustment Layer
    1. The Soul of the Art of Black-and-White Photography
    2. How to Dance with Multiple Partners on the Channel Mixer Dance Floor
    3. Image 1: Using a Multiple Channel Mixer Conversion Approach on a Portrait
    4. Image 2: Using a Multiple Channel Mixer Conversion Approach on a Landscape
    5. Conclusion
  16. Chapter 8. The Black and White on Silver Efex Pro 2
    1. The Black and White on the Silver Efex Pro 2 User Interface
    2. Image 1: Using a Single Silver Efex Pro 2 Smart Filter Layer
    3. Image 2: The Harmonics of Chording—The ABCs of Playing the RGBs
    4. Variations on a Theme: When Conversion Techniques Collide
    5. Conclusion
  17. Last Words: From There to Here—Where We Are on the RGB Road
  18. Afterword
  19. Index
  20. Add Page

Product information

  • Title: From Oz to Kansas: Almost Every Black and White Conversion Technique Known to Man
  • Author(s): Vincent Versace
  • Release date: August 2012
  • Publisher(s): New Riders
  • ISBN: 9780132838085