Digital BW, The Print

I too struggled with this same issue.

I suppose if you are careful and take really good notes you can 
eventually get pretty good at predicting how any of the B&W conversion 
methods will affect an image. My advise is to pick one horse and run 
with it. practice with it for a while and you'll figure it out.. it's 
not unlike learning how to play a musical instrument.

My horse is the Russell Preston Brown technique.

Click this link for the PDF file, if you're not familiar with it.
http://www.russellbrown.com/tips/pdf/colortoB&W.pdf

I have found that by modifying the "color" layer using the 
Hue/Saturation controls, I can easily dial up or dial down any part of 
the image by just selecting the appropriate color in the dropdown menu 
on the Hue/Saturation dialog box and adjusting its saturation and lightness.

If more overall contrast is needed, I just create a 3rd Adjustment Layer 
(Brightness/Contrast) and dial that in. In 2 weeks of practising this 
technique for about 1 hour a day, I'm very comfortable converting any image.

m

outdoornm wrote:

> Hello all,
>
> It is interesting to try all these methods to convert color scans
> into b&w (split channel, etc) However, there doesn't seem to be
> an effort to tie in the information that is available in the
> histograms.  Does anyone look at individual channels and say, "
> well that hump in the 200zone of the blue  channel is the sky" ? 
> Or that  hump in the 100zone of the green channel is the lawn" ?
> and that  50 zone hump of the red channel is the trunk of the
> trees", and so on...?"
>
> I ask these questions because converting to b&w doesn't seem
> to have any logical approach.  I find myself moving the sliders
> around without really understanding how I arrived at the image
> that I finally choose.
>
> Does anyone have a method for this "madness"?
>
>                                   Lincoln
>
>
>
>
>
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