Master of Mono

Once I had got over the initial beginners’ hurdles of photography, I decided I wanted to create a wide and varied collection of images something more than a single-style portfolio. I felt it was important to become a well-rounded photographer who could ply his art regardless of situation, style or environment. I hoped it would ensure my photography would stay fresh, challenging and, above all, interesting.

As my journey continued, I veered more and more towards black & white. While it wasn’t a conscious decision, the skew became increasingly obvious as time went on. This pull towards monochrome has never left me, and currently approximately 70% of my photographs are mono in one form or another. Black & white images, for me, contain a purity that their colour counterparts can never possess. They are timeless and they look beautiful among any surroundings. In my opinion, the same cannot be said for colour.

From a purely post-production point of view, and as strange as it seems, a colourless image is much more of a blank canvas than colour could ever be. Take, for example, contrast, which is the most important tool I have at my disposal. In monochrome, contrast can take you from light and airy to the depths of dark and moody, retaining its beauty at all times. Because of colour shifts and saturation, colour images are far more constrained, and can quickly become unattractive cartoons. Mono lends itself much more freely to the creative photographer.

INSPIRATION
Although my portfolio was varied and already contained many mono images, one style that didn’t feature in it was architecture. It was a subject that I had never viewed in an interesting light, metaphorically speaking. And then, it happened… I came across a selection of architectural images from Dutch photographer Joel Tjintjelaar. They were like nothing I had ever seen previously in architecture: artistic, eye-catching and, above all, in beautiful black & white.

I already had a good knowledge of Photoshop, and I knew that mastering it would be the key to producing artistic images such as Joel’s. After reading a few blogs and watching one of Joel’s videos, the next step was obvious: learn the relevant Photoshop tools required for this discipline. I knew it would be quite different from anything I’d done previously with my landscape and nature work. Buildings have strong, defined edges, curves, panels and even surfaces. It stands to reason that they require a new set of post-production skills.

Capturing an architectural image is pretty much the same as for any other long-exposure shot. The only slight difference may be the length of the exposure. I don’t have a standard setting for shutter speed; it solely depends on how fast the clouds are moving and how far I want them to travel across my frame. If the clouds are moving slowly, I may shoot a much longer exposure – anything up to 12mins is not unusual.

FRAMING
The beauty of combining architecture and monochrome is that both free you up, compositionally speaking. There are no foregrounds to worry about, no rule of thirds or any other preconceived ideas of what makes a nice landscape.

BEFORE AND AFTER

There is no doubt that post-processing, whether in the darkroom or on a computer, is one of the most important and complex aspects of photography even more so with this artistic style of architecture. 

It is critical that the original image is captured with as much information as possible, but even then, this only provides a good starting point. Next comes what I consider to be the ‘art’ in the ‘art of photography’: the creation of your vision through technical post-processing techniques, which is often much more difficult and complex than anything you can find on your camera. This is a very personal stage, where your image becomes unique and takes on your individual vision, be that true to the original scene or as far removed from it as your imagination allows.

BAD WEATHER

For me, architecture is by far the most rewarding of all the genres of photography. Unlike many others, it is not as reliant on weather, flattering light or time of day. The building or structure is 100 per cent of the image; it needs neither foreground nor colour in the sky. Simply make a good exposure with optimal settings and the camera’s job is complete – light, shadow and mood can all be taken care of later. For these reasons, architecture can still yield many keepers in weather that would prove unsuitable for most other types of outdoor photography. I can’t recall an architectural shoot to date that didn’t produce at least several usable images, which is not something that can be said for most photographic subjects.

With mono architecture, it doesn’t matter if you shoot part of a building, the whole building or a whole skyline of buildings. It is the shadows and contrast and drama that make the photograph, not just the subject.

Once back home, that’s when the real work begins. It can take anything from an hour up to several hours to produce an individual image, depending on what’s involved. I don’t use any plug-ins; everything is completed in the core Lightroom and Photoshop programs.

Although they can be time-consuming and repetitive, the processing techniques are actually relatively simple although a thorough understanding of basic Photoshop tools is a must. You need to be comfortable with aspects such as selections, organising layers, dodging and burning, applying gradients, and so on, as these provide you with everything you need for most images.

When processing a monochrome architectural image, my starting point is usually a basic black & white conversion that’s been carried out in either Lightroom or Photoshop. Once this is complete, I then take a look at the exposure and adjust it to create the overall atmosphere that I’m hoping to achieve. The sky and how it interacts with the building or buildings is vitally important to all my images, so the next step is to make an accurate selection, where further adjustments to contrast are applied, along with gradients.

The next step is the really painstaking part of the process. If I’m working on a single building, I make
selections of every face, window and piece of trim – I then simply dodge and burn each of these in turn until I have my desired effect. If I’m working on a skyline, I make individual selections of every building. When this is done, I finish the image by making some global adjustments to really fine-tune the atmosphere. 

One of the most important points to note about this whole process is that the deep shadows and eye-catching highlights can never come from the black & white conversion alone. They come from working on the many individual selections and transforming each of them into interesting areas in their own right.

Tips & Trick 8:06 AM