Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2013/07/08
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Sent from my iPhone Steve Barbour On Jul 8, 2013, at 10:45 PM, Peter Klein <pklein at threshinc.com> wrote: I'm reposting this in the new thread in the hopes that B.D. will see it and comment. Or anybody else. I'm interested in the "why" of what we like. Welcome back, B.D., hope you stick around! Tina, see my question for you at the end of the post. (Earlier, I wrote): To ask whether black and white or color is superior is like asking whether a string quartet is "better" than a full orchestra. It's almost a meaningless question. You can say what you prefer, you can say that this one or that one works better in certain situations. as this discussion has continued I've been struck by a possible parallel analogous observation/question... People read books...just words, in bw no less, often preferring this to a color movie of the same story...there I think this says it, I may be missing something but it really does seem related... s I shoot both. Digital is great because I don't have to limit myself when shooting. I let the picture tell me whether it wants to be in B&W. I generally do prefer B&W for people pictures. I think it helps remove other distractions and focus attention on the people, as B.D. said. There is also something beautiful and special about black and white (IMHO). Perhaps that's because I spent many hours looking at old Life Magazines and books of the great photojournalists when I was young. I've noticed that many thirty- or fortysomething Americans prefer color, but my Russian and Eastern European friends of the same age almost always prefer my B&W shots. Maybe we just like the visual language we learned as kids, just as most of us prefer the popular music from our childhood and teen years. When you're in places like Tina's Central America or Jayanand's India, color is such an overwhelming part of what you see, so it begs to be used. Still, I have to ask this: Tina, I'm thinking of your wonderful grainy B&W Noctilux shots in Central American huts, often by firelight. They have a specialness in part because they are B&W. Suppose you had an M(240) back then, or something else that could take decent photos at ISO 3200 or 6400. Would you have used color? --Peter _______________________________________________ Leica Users Group. See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information