How much color correction do you do before converting to monochrome?

[gerafotografija]

I recently took some low ambient light pictures of people and found that I was able to get more satisfactory b/w images if I spent considerable time correcting color issues before coverting. Is this what others do as well? I guess if I had a Leica Monochrome M it wouldn't even be an option.

I previously used Aperture 3 for converting, and played with the RGB sliders in the conversion filter, but now that I have AS Exposure, I am getting better results by first finding the best color rendition I can manage with the full color image before applying the conversion filter of choice for b/w (often with only a default color filter setting).

Here is a link to a somewhat lengthy annotated workflow description and a few resulting photos.

https://gerafotografija.wordpress.com/2012/10/17/low-ambient-light-people-pictures/

I'm curious to know what other people do with difficult momochrome conversions.

Thanks

[Alan Klein]

I move the sliders until it looks good to my eyes.  I figure if it looks good to me, it must look pretty good to others.

[ErikKaffehr]

Hi,

The Monochrome is like panchromatic film. No built in rendition of color. You need to use filters like we used to have in film days.

Best regards
Erik

I recently took some low ambient light pictures of people and found that I was able to get more satisfactory b/w images if I spent considerable time correcting color issues before coverting. Is this what others do as well? I guess if I had a Leica Monochrome M it wouldn't even be an option.

I previously used Aperture 3 for converting, and played with the RGB sliders in the conversion filter, but now that I have AS Exposure, I am getting better results by first finding the best color rendition I can manage with the full color image before applying the conversion filter of choice for b/w (often with only a default color filter setting).

Here is a link to a somewhat lengthy annotated workflow description and a few resulting photos.

https://gerafotografija.wordpress.com/2012/10/17/low-ambient-light-people-pictures/

I'm curious to know what other people do with difficult momochrome conversions.

Thanks

[stamper]

The problem with colour is that when you convert an image to B&W the the blues, reds and greens that were easily identifiable before conversion become tonally the same. Best practise is when you can change the tones after conversion to look different - lighter or darker - thus producing a better tonal range which is what B&W is all about.

[jonathanlung]

If/when I make colour adjustments before converting to monochrome, I tend to make some colours pretty wild (a "de-correction" if you will) so that I can increase tonal contrast with the monochrome R, G, and B sliders.

[Alan Klein]

DOes anyone kniow how to change the colors before converting to B/W using Lightroom 3?  It seem that when I sdwitch, the colors go back to what was there.  The only way I found around this, is to save the file as a Tiff first after I adjust the colors and then re-open it and convert to B/W

[EduPerez]

I usually do the color correction after converting to B&W...

I use RawTherapee to process my RAWs, but I guess this would work with any other processor. When I decide to convert an image to B&W, I first lower the saturation to the minimum, and then play with the color balance and the RGB sliders. I am not interested in producing a "correct" color image, if the final result is going to be B&W, and quite often that intermediate color image ends with wild and surreal colors. But with this method, I can see how the changes affect to the final result.

[jonathanlung]

+1 to EduPerez; really, I'm twiddling with the colour controls while looking at the results in B/W.

[Alan Klein]

What I was refering to in LR3, when I chenge the HUe, Saturation or Luminance before switching to B/W, the levels go back to nominal.  The only way around this is to change the HSL and then save as a TIFF file.  Then I re-open and when I then switch to B/W, I'm starting off with different levels of HSL in the COlors.  Is ther a way to efffect change in HSL that will remain when you switch to B/W without having to use this intermediate TIFF save step?