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How to Edit Black and White Photos in Lightroom Mobile

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How to Edit Black and White Photos in Lightroom Mobile

Color plays a leading role when we talk about photography, since through it we will be able to tell stories and convey emotions. In the full visual, emotions are very important since we usually seek to awaken some kind of them in the observer of our work. Depending on how we use that color, we are going to be able to awaken one or another type of emotions and feelings. In fact, the same image treated in different ways can evoke different results and hence the magic of color and its importance. Surely you have already experienced sensations in which, for example, an image where the predominant color is blue and there is some darkness causes some kind of melancholic, mysterious and even wintery effect. However,

 

Just as color will allow us to configure our composition within a framework of possible final emotions, working from the absence of it will also lead to one result or another. The use of black and white as a resource has been present since the birth of photography where it was the only possibility and over time, although it had to share prominence with the use of color, the truth is that it has never lost its potential when it comes to composing. audiovisually. If we focus, for example, on a type of photography such as the portrait image, black and white can be a configuration in which we achieve truly incredible results, since by eliminating color information, the look, for example, plays a very leading role, something that with color does not have the same interest..

 

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If we continue in this line of example of portrait photography, black and white means giving much more nuance to the expressions and textures of the skin, inviting the observer to immerse themselves in the details of the image, something that when we have all the chromatic resources in front of us We do not observe in the same way. The depth that color gives in black and white can be the great ally in creating really fantastic photos and that is why you have to take into account elements such as the background or everything that surrounds the subject to decide if the black and white configuration is the right one. More appropriate. Perhaps a landscape with many chromatic nuances loses great relevance if we submit it to the black and white configuration, all this will depend on the final objective that you want to achieve.

 

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If we make a composition in which we know how to focus attention on an element or subject and we also incorporate a black and white configuration, the result will surely be a photograph with a high emotional content that necessarily generates a specific emotion for the user and that otherwise would not it would have been possible. That's why today we want to show you how we can create black and white photos in Lightroom Mobile both manually and automatically and even by creating your own presets to quickly apply them at any time to your images..

 

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How to Edit Black and White Photos in Lightroom Mobile


As we are seeing today, the black and white configuration is a very valid option that is important to take into account when composing our photographs. Although sometimes black and white is considered a type of color configuration, the truth is that this is not entirely true if we also rely on the theory of light color, black would be the absence of light and color would be the phenomenon of light itself. . Although black and white could not be called scientifically as colors, the truth is that due to its capacity to transmit emotions and feelings, black and white could be considered in a non-technical way as color when working with it. in audiovisual compositions. We could also talk about black and white from the theory of color based on the additive mixture or the subtractive mixture.

 

Beyond the more or less scientific consideration that we have about black and white, what is clear is that its use has a direct impact on the result of our photographs and that is why it is important to know in part what we can transmit with it to work your setup one way or another. So, within a style based on black and white we could get emotions like the following:

 

  • Sadness
  • Death
  • Tragedy
  • Melancholia
  • Fear
  • Mystery
  • Can
  • Elegance

 

 

 

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All these meanings are evoked by the black and white styles in a very exponential way made a feeling their emotions that we can not collect when we have a full color photograph. That is why a black and white style is a very powerful weapon to captivate the observer because we know that it will have a direct influence on his emotions. Understanding the psychology of color is important in order to know how to apply one technique or another to our compositions, since we are not always going to get the result we are looking for, since not all compositions are valid or equally effective for it. What we do have to keep in mind is that black and white are the most important colors that we are going to have when editing and designing, since they are in charge of expressing both the light and shadow content of our photographs.

 

As you know, black and white are not colors as such, but they are going to be important when it comes to giving a color configuration to our photographs, so today we are going to teach you how to edit black and white photos in Lightroom Mobile getting very different results in your photographs. If you have an image in which you want to convey any of the emotions that we have suggested above, we invite you to use it to set its style in black and white and further enhance what you want to convey, as we are going to see below..

 

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Although it is in black and white, the original file contains that color information, so we can also work on them from here, being able to lighten or darken them.

 

 

Edit black and white photos manually in Lightroom Mobile
We are going to start by seeing how we can work on the black and white style manually in Lightroom Mobile, working on the absence of color and adjusting the lights and shadows to achieve totally personalized results in our photos.

 

We can start by removing the color information from our photography manually using the settings that Lightroom Mobile brings for it. Before we begin to modify the lighting settings and others, we are going to focus on the color options, for this we open our image in Lightroom Mobile and click on the "Color" category at the bottom of the image.

 

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We will see that we are allowed to adjust different elements related to color. In this case, since what we are interested in is the intensity of the colors of our photograph, we are going to remove this information by completely lowering the "Saturation" of the photograph.

 

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Although we see the color information desaturated to the maximum with a black and white effect, we can also retouch here color settings such as "Temperature", "Intensity" or "Hue" that modify the shadow and lighting area of ​​our photograph.

 

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Although color information apparently does not seem to exist, the truth is that it is still there and that is why working with it ends up giving different results in photography. To enter a quick black and white mode we will also be able to click on the "B and W" option of the "Color" panel that will quickly transfer the photograph to this mode.

 

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If we want to make sure that no shade of color appears in our photograph, we can go to the "Color" panel and enter "Mix" to see the color segmentation.

 

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Here we will see a separation of colors that allows editing each one individually based on "Hue", "Saturation" and "Luminance". What we will do is set the “Saturation” parameter in each color to the minimum value -100.

 

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We apply the changes made using the "Done" button that appears above the color selection.

 

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Once we have the color information already worked on in our photography and we have gone to Black and White mode, we can continue working on our image on lighting issues. To do this, we are going to click on the “Light” option.

 

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Here we will be able to work on each of the Light parameters depending on the final effect that we want to give. It will depend on how much light and dark area our image has to determine which parts we reduce or increase. In this case, having so much dark area, we are going to raise Highlights, Shadows and Whites in addition to Exposure to get more contrast. We also modified the part of Blacks to enhance them more.

 

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You can work directly on the light curve if we click on the "Curve" option of the main panel in which we are.

 

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Here we will be able to add more control points if we want where to generate changes in the lighting graph manually. This way we will be able to mark where we want to do a work of contrast between light and shadow.

 

Click on the “Done” button when you have finished this edition.

 

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Many times, working on black and white images has the objective of simulating photography resulting from analog cameras, so we could add a grain effect to our photography to emulate it. To do this we will go to the "Effects" section and look for the "Grain" option. We will establish some values ​​that we like for the final result of the photograph by moving the sliders of:

 

  • Grain
  • Size
  • Rugosity

 

 

 

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If you want from this "Effects" section we can also apply a known effect that is "Vignette". Since we want it to be dark, we will move the slider to the left thus giving negative values.

 

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There may be specific areas of your photo where you want to specifically lighten or darken more. If this is your case, we have an option with which to work with black and white in a timely manner. For this we are going to use the “Mask” tool.

 

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We are going to create a new skin using the “+” icon that we see at the bottom of the screen.

 

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In the type of mask that we are going to use, we will choose the "Brush" one since it is the type that allows us to select the areas to work more manually.

 

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On the left side we have different options with which to configure our brush. Once we have it ready we can start painting on the area or areas in which we want to make changes.

 

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Once we have delimited the work area under that red color that we see, we can play with its lighting from the "Light" section. Here we will modify its parameters, achieving the effect we want, in this case, darken that area more.

 

  • Exposure: -0.06
  • Contrast: +57
  • Illuminations: +28
  • Shadows: -5
  • White: +16
  • Blacks: -35

 

 

 

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If there are several zones that you want to work on, don't worry because you can click again on create a new mask and add the ones you need to modify different zones.

 

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We apply the changes within our skins panel with the upper check icon.

 

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We will already have our black and white image edited and personalized according to our objective and preferred style.

 

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If you liked the configuration that you have made in black and white in a personalized way for your photography, you can create your own preset or preset adjustment and thus be able to use it whenever you want quickly.

 

To do this, click on the three upper points of the menu that appears:

 

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Now we will select the option "Create preset" to generate a new preset.

 

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In this window we are going to give a certain name and select all those settings that we have changed and that we want to be part of our preset setting.

 

To save the preset, click on the check and it will be saved in the own presets section.

 

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Then you can use your created black and white preset on any other photo whenever you want.

 

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Edit black and white photos automatically in Lightroom Mobile
In this section we are going to see a faster way to give our photos a black and white style thanks to the settings that are already preset in Lightroom Mobile. As they are already created adjustments, we will only have to click on them to apply them, so it will take much less time to achieve this style.

 

If you want a much faster edition of your black and white photography, you can also work with the "Presets" section that you will find in the lower panel.

 

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Here we will find different categories, although the one that interests us will be “Portraits: Black and White”. Click on it to see the options.

 

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We will see that you have different preset settings in black and white mode that will allow you to put your photo in this style quickly. Click on the one you want to see the change applied to the image. Apply the changes fully to the setting using the upper right check box that appears.

 

You can start with one of these settings and then complement it with manual modifications as we have seen before.

 

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Another option to work quickly with black and white color is the use of profiles. These profiles apply some quick color adjustments that usually help us to have an already modified base automatically. To do this we can look for the "Profiles" option in the lower panel.

 

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You have the option to click on the name of the current category and see different possible options. In this case we are interested in the B&W mode since it will include the black and white profiles that we are looking for.

 

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Then we just have to click on one of the profiles that Lightroom Mobile offers to transform our photo in Black and White mode with this color profile easily. After applying it, you can include manual modifications as we have seen today in case you want to make any modifications.

 

You can click on one of the profiles if you want to adjust the "Amount" of intensity that will be applied to the image.

 

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In this way we will get a black and white image from Lightroom Mobile in a personalized way but much faster if we do not have enough time.

 

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In this way we can create and edit black and white photographs within Lightroom Mobile either manually or through preset settings and profiles that automatically switch to black and white mode.


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