Projct 52: Week 16 - Black and White

This week's assignment from David DuChemin's book "The Visual Toolbox" was to "try it in black and white." Who doesn't love color? After all, we see the world in colors every day. But sometimes color becomes the main element in an image pulling the viewer's eye away from other elements. Some questions to ask yourself when converting an image to black and white are:

What does the image gain without color?

How does the mood of the image change?

Are there lines, textures, or the gesture of a moment that are now stronger for the lack of color?

I knew I wanted to find a location that had a lot of texture and lines in it to photograph for this assignment. I found this great little alcove at a local park and the light was just perfect when I arrived. Izzy, of course, was her usual wonderful self modeling for me. There are less lines than I originally wanted to include, but I think converting to black and white, you can see how removing color changes this image. Which one do you like better? Why?

Personally, I like both, but for very different reasons.