March 2, 2009
Improved Grayscale conversions
Shortly after the release of Lightroom 1.0, I made a video tutorial which showed how you could use the HSL panel controls to achieve improved, reduced noise Grayscale conversions in Lightroom. That particular problem was resolved with one of the later Lightroom 1.x updates and it is now fine to use the Grayscale panel controls to achieve optimum black and white conversions. In this movie I wanted to show how you can also fine-tune the Grayscale conversion setting by combining these with Camera Calibration panel adjustments.
Howdy
On playing on-line the audio disappears after 5/8th or 3/4 of the way through, also on downloading the .mov the audio is not there after approximate time referenced above.
Terence
ditto the previous post – fails to load completely, IE7 and Chrome.
The above problem has now been fixed. There was probably a problem with the upload to the blog site.
Another great video Martin, thanks. Question however. I built a preset as you recommended in the original video with -100 sat for all colors. It appears one advantage is, I can still play with Vibrance and Saturation as well as using the Camera Calibration pane. While the original idea of yours was to bypass the noise in using the grayscale option, do you feel working this way has any advantages including the ability to still access Vibrance and Sat?
I think I might have mentioned in the video that I find the HSL method still does have some uses: namely you can as you point out, tweak the Saturation or Vibrance and this can influence the black and white conversion output. Another tip is to experiment with different White Balance settings. This will work whichever method you use. The Camera Calibration panel tip is one that I feel allows some even finer control over black and white conversions and allows me to push the limits a little further where images allow.
Cool. It does seem that using your original technique provides more options since the image is considered “color”. I’ll stick with my old -100 Sat.
I still mainly use Saturation method (though I did try the grayscale method on my sample to see if that would fix the problem. It didn’t.)
I get a weird problem – I get white or sometimes dark “halos” on edges. I make sure I got rid of chromatic aberration but the lines still show up – see example here:
http://www.davidpalermo.com/edge.jpg
Do any of you know how to fix this problem? Sharpening and Noise Reduction seems to alter it but I can’t eliminate it. I don’t remember film looking like this ; )
Thanks,
David
In the link you provide, the main problem in the original seems more like blooming rather than chromatic aberration and this is one reason for the main halo seen here.
The other slider controls you should explore using are the HSL panel where you could apply negative saturation to certain colours such as red. Or, you could do what I did here and try experimenting with the Camera Calibration panel sliders to see what effect they can have, and at the same time go a little lighter on the negative Luminance for the Aquas and Blues.
When adjusting my B&W photos with the HSL sliders I notice that making too much of an adjustment can create alot of grain in that color area. Is that normal?
Marc,
It depends on the image really and what you are trying to do to it. As you push the limits with the HSL sliders or the Grayscale conversion sliders there is a chance that you may see some enhanced noise as a result of this. Try adjusting the Luminance and Color Noise reduction sliders to see if these can help mitigate the undesired effect.