There has been a discussion, ever since the first color film canister rolled off the production line, about whether black and white is more timeless than color. If you asked me that 10 years ago, when I was knee-deep in several of the best Nikon cameras of the time, only shooting color, I would have said: “Of course not, we all see in color.”
However, now I’m a bit older – and maybe wiser? I have fallen in love with black and white photography for that “timeless look” and it looks like something different in a world full of color. I now shoot 95% of my work in black and white. Because of the process, it helped save my best DSLR in my kit, the Nikon D800 from the scrap heap and became a camera that I truly enjoy using again.
Panoramic of a quarry in Cornwall, UK (Image credit: Future / Sebastian Oakley)
Now before anyone starts, I understand this is not a “true” monochrome shooting experience, which would see a camera have its Bayer filter removed. My black and white settings are just a jpeg preset – but with a twist!
I have always been a big advocate of using Kelvin white balance settings to get the sharpest images possible, but I have always set my own image profile settings to in camera. – and these two combined give me a look I truly wanted for my black and white photography.
I understand these are just jpeg settings, but if you get it right in-camera then you have no editing to do later. That’s a win-win in my book. It also made me take this now 12-year-old camera back out of retirement, rather than ending up on the scrap heap, or worse the dreaded display shelf! Sorry to my first Nikon D2H that’s currently on the said shelf all battered and bruised as a display trophy of my photography career.
Heart of stone by Sebastian Oakley (Image credit: Future / Sebastian Oakley)
Since moving to the Leica M-system, my trusty Nikon D800 that travelled the world with me hadn’t been picked up in over two years.
While I say it is saved from the scrap heap, I have had a habit of keeping all my old cameras until they don’t turn on anymore. Like the Nikon D1 I have. Yes, I still have the very first Nikon digital camera ever made. I can’t even use it as I’ve no battery charger to charge the battery anymore. It’s 25 years old and I still haven’t thrown it away yet!
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But switching my D800 into a B&W image preset of my own making (adjusting contrast, grain, saturation, and sharpness from the original Mochochrome setting built into the Nikon D800) made me want to pick up this clunky DSLR more. Now I’m pleased to say that it’s in a constant rotation of cameras I go out to use on a weekly basis.
Old industry by Sebastian Oakley (Image credit: Future / Sebastian Oakley)
So let this be a lesson to all, if you have cameras of yester-year lying around why not take them out of retirement and use them for something you never used to shoot them for, or simply start shooting in black and white as I did – it’s a very surreal experience, enjoying equipment that you had long forgotten about and finding new use for it.
I highly recommend it. It has kept my Nikon D800 alive 12 years on, and sparked a new interest in my photography, winning all around in my book, and best of all it didn’t cost me a single penny to do!
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