Aside from the 20 mono tips, the mag is overloaded with other photography tips.

This is issue number 15 simply entitled (BW)³, (Barren Worlds, Bad Weather, Black & White), as a Black & White Photography enthusiast myself, I’m intrigued of what new techniques I will learn from this issue.

For my post-processing style, I don’t just use the black & white conversion feature of the Photoshop, I put extra effort (& labor) to fit my own taste & this is what I’m sharing right now.

I make sure that I start with a good photograph, right composition & proper exposure is the key. I picked this photo of a smiling kid & will try to convert it into black & white.

The first thing that I did is to convert the picture into monochrome using Channel Mixer [Image --> Adjustments --> Channel Mixer], then I clicked on the Monochrome box located on the lower left portion of the pop-up window. Then, I adjusted the Red, Blue & Green channels to fit my taste [For this project Red = +20, Blue = +60 & Green = +20), once satisfied, just click OK for the changes to take effect.

The next step is to duplicate the layer [Layer --> Duplicate Layer], once the layer has been duplicated, change the Blending Mode to Overlay, notice that the photo will lighten a little bit. It’s now time to apply some filter.

On the menu, click on Filter –> Blur –> Gaussian Blur, I normally apply a filter radius ranging from 10 to 20 pixels, on this project, I opted to have it at 15 pixels.

Next on the filters list is the Noise [Filter --> Noise --> Add Noise] for the grainy effect on the finished product. I don’t want the noise to be overpowering so I just set it at 7.

After that, I just merged the layers [ctrl+Shift+E], resized the photo & that’s basically it.

Just remember that while photoshop is there to help us enhance our photos, what really matters is how we take the pictures, our skill is still the most important thing to develop.

No one can deny that Filipinos are crazy about basketball, in every community you will find at least one basketball court in it, i can be either half court or full court. Like this street that was converted into a mini basketball court where old & young share their passion on the sport.

The key in capturing infrared photos is the timing, the most suitable time is around noon where the sunlight is at it’s peak, the elements must also be present i.e. clouds, blue sky & green leaves or grass. I went on a shooting spree around 2pm today & here’s what I got.


I shot the above photo using RAW/NEF format of my Nikon D70 camera using an 18-135mm lens. The exposure time is set at 1 second, aperture at f8 @ ISO200 & white balance at 3000° Kelvin (Fluorescent +3). I downloaded the photo using Camera Raw 4.2 of Photoshop CS3, I noticed the reddish cast of the photo which (I believe) is not normal. I’ve seen alot of sample shots & I’ve never seen something like this, I think I need to experiment more on other settings.

Anyways, since I’m not that satisfied, I adjusted some settings when I downloaded the below photos.

I did some adjustments on the Camera Raw before finally opening it with Photoshop until I finally removed the reddish casts on the photo. I then edited it to fit my taste. The first option is to use a brownish sepia tone, I added some blur & noise on the photo to my liking to get this look.

FinallyI tried it on a black & white photo with additional blur & noise.

Infrared is not a new photographic technique, even during the film era, infrared photography is quite popular to some. It’s an interesting field that I might study more.

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