scoleman123 opened this issue on Apr 30, 2007 · 10 posts
scoleman123 posted Mon, 30 April 2007 at 2:48 PM
Is there any way to make a better looking BW print than using the channel mixer?
Would I have to change the print profiles in order to ahve a more true BW color?
Any help is great.
-steve
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aprilgem posted Mon, 30 April 2007 at 3:21 PM
I'm not sure which technique you use exactly, but for myself, I like using the LAB mode and taking the BW from the L channel.
Aeneas posted Mon, 30 April 2007 at 4:55 PM
The luminance channel does give the exact greyscale values.
But for print you face the problem of having four or more coloured inks.
I personally prefer duotone (or even tritone) with a black and a near grey (a tiny bit blueish or brownish)
I have tried prudent planning long enough. From now I'll be mad. (Rumi)
prixat posted Mon, 30 April 2007 at 6:43 PM
Attached Link: BW conversions
They are discussing BW conversions over in photography...regards
prixat
Imager posted Mon, 30 April 2007 at 9:21 PM
Put two Hue/Saturation adjustment layers above your image. In the top adjustment layer, slide the saturation button all the way to the left. On the layer directly above your image, set the blending mode to Color. Now slide that layer's Hue button left or right and you will see the B&W
tones in your image change.
scoleman123 posted Tue, 01 May 2007 at 8:56 AM
@imager - wha? can you be a little more clear please?
@aprilgem- could you explain this a little more please?
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aprilgem posted Tue, 01 May 2007 at 1:20 PM
scoleman, go to Image > Mode > Lab color. Then go to the channels palette and highlight the Lightness channel (so that both the A and B channels are NOT seen), and you should see a pretty decent grayscale of your image. If you like that grayscale, go to Image > Mode > Grayscale, and when it asks if you want to discard the other channels, click OK.
spedler posted Tue, 01 May 2007 at 4:04 PM
IMHO channel mixing is still the best way of colour->mono conversion. The Imgage->Adjustment->Desaturate command just reduces each channel to zero saturation, which I think is what Imager's method will do. Image->Mode->Grayscale weights each channel so that the three channels are combined in the proportions R:G:B 30%:59%:11%. This is supposed to produce an image which looks better to the eye.
LAB mode gives the same weighting as Grayscale but always looks lighter (so many people prefer it) as the L channel is deliberately darkened when combined with the A and B channels. Dan Margulis, the guru of LAB mode, doesn't recommend this method for mono conversion.
Which all leaves channel mixing as the best method, but it's also the most difficult one to get really good results - you need to analyse the channels carefully for best results.
Steve
karosnikov posted Sun, 06 May 2007 at 11:04 AM
Duplicate history state (tiny icon button 3rd from the left, (next to camera and the bin) in history palette. compare the two documents side by side after the techniques
image > mode > lab,
show channels palette ... click the "Lightness" channel, edit select all. copy.
image > mode > rgb
paste, select pasted layer
show layers palette - change opacity 75%
select background (colorful) layer
image > adjust > gradient map. use the black to white gradient.
some images may need the mid point moved or a dark shade of grey shadow tones or an off-white highlights but at lower opacities, the gradient map fills in some tonal range unchanged
bonestructure posted Sun, 13 May 2007 at 9:09 AM
I use a free plugin called Photo Wiz. It converts an image to black and white while leaving it as an RGB or whatever. The advantage this has, for me, is that it allows me to still use curves, adjust contrast, etc, use filters, whatever I like, which grayscale doesn't. Photo wiz also has a lot of other good filters..
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