converting a colour pic to true black and white.....

Lynton

Lynton

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Lynton (yes really!)
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Just what do I have to do on photoshop elements 7 or CS3 to convert a full colour to true B&W???

Tried lots but all seem to have a hint of sepia / brown in them............

Maybe its my eyes, maybe the monitor, maybe the printer.........
 
You'll want to Desaturate the image in CS3
Image - Adjustments- Desaturate

Or same menu - Black & White

Or its your eyes, maybe the monitor, maybe the printer.........
 
Best way is a black and white adjustment layer.

This will be true black and white, and allows you complete control over the conversion.

If you're seeing colour in it (and you haven't applied any toning) then your monitor may need calibrating. Make sure you're in a fairly neutral light as well when working on the computer.

EDIT: is it black and white on screen, and then off in the print?
 
Try this first, go to image mode greyscale, click yes to discard and you should have a totally B+W image, (you have just removed the colour information) if it's not B+W it's your monitor most lightly, or maybe video card/drivers etc.
This isn't the best way of getting a good visually B+W but it is a good way to check.
 
:plusone:
Bardo said:
All the advice given so far is very sound. All I'd add is that if you want powerful tonal control over your B&W, take a look at Nik Software's 'Silver Efex Pro' plug-in for photoshop... a very, very impressive peice of software
Click to expand...
 
Cheers for your help guys - just got in from out and about........

Will check all this in the morning when have some natural daylight instead of all this bloody tungsten and low wattage energy saving flourouscent stuff......... normally end up doing this latish at night, so maybe need a "daylight bulb"

I am sure the problem exists between the monitor and the keyboard.......... or the monitor......


Jayst84 - Appears to be B&W onscreen then a hint of Sepia in the printed image.......... so maybe monitor calibration req'd..........

Bardo - cheers - will check it out.


Anyway thanks all so far......


Quick edit.... $200. Ouch!!!
 
If at home, what's your printer? How many cartridges? Is one of them black?
 
Hello Again, printing at home - Canor Pixar i3600 which has 5 cartridges, Black, Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and another black one.

Have tried using others to print - experience of online - photobox - very very good, and very quick. Going into a high street store - not so great! - generally unhappy with the colours overall, however i guess if they are printing 100's an hour - then on cheapish paper.........
 
Have you tried DSCL recently had some black and whites from there....top stuff.
 
on most Canon printers, in the printer properties window, there's an option for greyscale printing, which stops the printer using anything but the black cartridge - try checking this, and re-printing. If it still looks to have a colour caste then it must be the paper - are you using genuine Canon inks and Paper? Having said that, I manage to get proper mono images out of a Pixma iP4600 using Canon inks and £5 for 50 sheets A4 Glossy from Lidl, so it doesn't always follow :shrug:
 
Lots of ways to convert to Mono One way not mention much is to change from RGB to lab and then delete the a and b channels but the best way is to short in RAW and you can convert to mono in ACR much more control
You will note I call it Mono as to be correct it is mono as the image has only one colour and that is black the white is your paper so mono tone of black giving you all the shades of grey.
 
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