High Mountain Dawn: Black and White, or Color?

The sun rises behind Mt. Oxford, mountain shadows on the clouds. Colorado, 2014

I really, really love monochrome images. Sometimes, though, color becomes such an important element of composition that it is just impossible to ignore.

Take the sunrises I witness whilst on the flanks or summit of a high Colorado Peak…The dawn colors are sometimes so powerful that I know immediately as I make the capture that the photograph will stay in color. That is why, in my 14er reports, the majority of images are in color.

On the other hand, sometimes there will be certain shadow patterns, tones, lines, shapes, or textures that will attract my black and white eye. In these cases, I usually know as I make the capture, that the image will be converted to monochrome.

Spectacular clouds in the sky will generally enhance both black and white and color, so I get really excited when I see something other than the usual, boring, plain, dark blue, blank, Colorado sky. (My recent post 14er Report: Belford and Oxford Double has some great examples of what I mean.)

So, as you make your images in the camera, be thinking about which way you might go with the final product in post-processing. Would it look best in black and white, or in color?

One technique some photographers use is to set the camera up to show a black and white version on the LCD during capture. As long as you are still also capturing the original RAW file, you’ll still have all the color information available–but, in a glance at the screen, you’ll get an idea of how a scene might look in monochrome. (For a full explanation, see Mastering Monochrome Mode by the Digital Photography School.)

Here are three black and white photographs from Belford-Oxford to compare with the color versions you have already seen if you read the previous post: