DIY Photography

Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time

  • News
  • Inspiration
  • Reviews
  • Tutorials
  • DIY
  • Gear
Search

Submit A Story

Colour grading black & white images in Lightroom is apparently a thing – Here’s how to do it

Jan 8, 2021 by John Aldred 2 Comments

  • Share
  • Tweet
  • Flipboard
  • WhatsApp

This kind of struck me as a little bit weird at first. Mostly because it was something I’d never even considered. Toning, sure, but split toning the shadows and highlights separately on a black and white image that doesn’t actually have any native colour whatsoever? Yeah, kinda weird. But the more I watched this video from photographer Anthony Morganti, the more it intrigued me.

It’s an interesting idea, to add colour to a black & white image – and not in the colourising sense, but doing the same kind of shadow and highlight tints we might typically do to a colour image or video sequence. For stills, though, in Lightroom, it’s pretty easy to do, too.

In the 8-minute video, Anthony goes over the process multiple times. It’s not that it’s a difficult or complex process (it only really takes advantage of Lightroom’s “Color Grading” tab), just that there’s a lot to colour theory and figuring out what goes with what. So, Anthony uses different image examples to talk through complementary colours, triad colours and analogous colours.

I’m not sure it’s a technique I’d want to employ often in my own imagery – at least not for black & whites – but it is a pretty interesting technique that can add new dimension to your otherwise mono shots.

Is this a technique you use with your black & whites?

FIND THIS INTERESTING? SHARE IT WITH YOUR FRIENDS!

  • Share
  • Tweet
  • Flipboard
  • WhatsApp

Related posts:

Easy but powerful colour correction and grading using colour wheels Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw are getting video-style wheels for advanced colour grading A simple seven-step process to create dramatic black and white images in Lightroom Cinematic Color Grading With Lightroom Desert Portrait Man and Woman Near Las VegasCinematic Color Grading With Lightroom

Filed Under: Tutorials Tagged With: Anthony Morganti, Black & White, color grading, toning

About John Aldred

John Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.

« Take these five steps to instantly improve your portraits
This software lets you test movie lights without leaving your home »

Submit A Story

Get our FREE Lighting Book

DIYP lighting book cover

* download requires newsletter signup
DIYPhotography

Recent Comments

Free Resources

Advanced lighting book

Recent Posts

  • Canon is starting to let 3rd parties make RF mount lenses
  • Canon recalls some EOS R10 bodies over “loud noises”
  • Netflix sued for using unauthorized drone footage in advertisement
  • This massive 114-gigapixel virtual tour of Barcelona took three months to create
  • Canon EOS R3 facial recognition now knows who to focus on in a crowd

Alex Baker is a portrait and lifestyle driven photographer based in Valencia, Spain. She works on a range of projects from commercial to fine art and has had work featured in publications such as The Daily Mail, Conde Nast Traveller and El Mundo, and has exhibited work across Europe

Dave Williams is an accomplished travel photographer, writer, and best-selling author from the UK. He is also a photography educator and published Aurora expert. Dave has traveled extensively in recent years, capturing stunning images from around the world in a modified van. His work has been featured in various publications and he has worked with notable brands such as Skoda, EE, Boeing, Huawei, Microsoft, BMW, Conde Nast, Electronic Arts, Discovery, BBC, The Guardian, ESPN, NBC, and many others.

John Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.

Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.

Copyright © DIYPhotography 2006 - 2023 | About | Contact | Advertise | Write for DIYP | Full Disclosure | Privacy Policy