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Re: [OM] Black and white portraits

Subject: Re: [OM] Black and white portraits
From: Joel Wilcox <jowilcox@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 09:58:36 -0500
At 05:53 PM 9/14/1999 -0700, you wrote:
>
>Not wanting to disappoint my son can someone please advise me which:
>
>1. Filters I should get or borrow........ yellow, blue, etc
>
>2. Film is likely to be the most appropriate .........good for clear or
>cloudy skies and with good exposure latitude.
>

Not sure I have much to add, but I'll post for the sake of "consensus."

Try to get a light green filter. Great for skin tones.  My favorite is one
of the Nikons, which has its own peculiar system (which I probably don't
need to punctuate for this group) of numbering. Tiffen has something
similar.  Yellow is good in some ways (if your subjects have blue eyes) but
the green is better particularly in the relation of the subject to the
environment (natural foliage, etc.) while somewhat darkening colors that
don't otherwise fall naturally into place on the panchromatic spectrum
(blues, etc.)

Don't forget your polarizer. If it would have a beneficial effect on color
film in the same situation, it will be good with BW too.

I've been happy with TMax for people shots.  Since I've been going from
film to digital, I've enjoyed TMax the best.  Believe it or not, in the
digital stream, some BW emulsions have better "color" than others.  I don't
understand this, but there is it. But YMMV.

On the other hand, if it is likely that this will all go to digital for
output, someone might say why don't you just shoot it in the color films
you like, and then convert to grayscale in your favorite imaging software.

Have fun.  Sounds like a cool project to me.

Joel Wilcox
Iowa City, Iowa USA

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