Pam's Week 10 - I'm Back, Back in Black (and White)

So I have to say that black and white photography is not my strong suit.  Of course, that sentence implies that I have a strong suit when it comes to photography which may be a tad misleading, but black and white is definitely something I need work on.  I love the look of black and white photography, but my attempts never look like I hope they will.  Apparently Sharon said that her book on black and white photography said that you have to take the photo in colour first and then convert it to black and white so I tried that this week and although it may be nicer than those I took with the black and white setting on the camera, they still don't have the contrast I was hoping for.

On Monday morning on my way to work, in the dark thanks to the time change that has left me exhausted all week, the fog and lights in the hospital parking lot caused the ice on the trees to sparkle spectacularly.  I immediately pictured how stunning a photo of this could be.  Unfortunately, my hands were full with bags and my travel mug with my camera stuffed in my purse.  I was sure I could replicate the shot I pictured on another day but it just didn't happen again.  Trust me when I tell you how spectacular that picture would have looked had I been able to capture it.

On Monday evening, Sharon and I, a few of our book club friends, some other friends of mine and friends of theirs headed to the Water Tower Pub for the Sault's first PaintNite.  We had great fun and painted some great pictures but I didn't think the cherry blossoms would look good in black and white so no pictures were taken that day at all.

This first photo is one I actually took quite a few years ago on my first digital camera (a whopping 2.3 megapixels).  It is of 2 little boys that ended up being my accidental tour guides while I visited Burma.

On Tuesday night, Duncan has cubs so after dropping him off, I decided to take advantage of the milder weather and partly sunny skies to head to Bellevue Park and the Art Gallery to take a few photos.

 I liked the loneliness of this tree and picnic table.

 Unfortunately there was no one sitting on this bench, looking out at the frozen river.

The sun was setting behind these trees at the Art Gallery.  

On Wednesday, I thought that maybe we could take a drive out to the windmills to take a picture.  I just thought maybe there'd be some cool shadows that would look nice in black and white.  By the time we got ourselves organized, however, the sun was too low to cast much of a shadow and we were worried about the potential condition of the gravel road  given the milder temperatures and rutted, potholey, slushy mess the paved city streets were.  Instead, Robert drove down to the locks where I took the next couple of photos.

 I really liked this funky tree.

Robert pointed out the cool reflections in the puddles.

I then tried to replicate a cool photo of some forks that I saw when I googled "black and white photography ideas".  Unfortunately, I wasn't happy with the way any of mine turned out.  Instead, I took some more photos of my amaryllis that is blooming nicely and converted them to black and white.  I also applied a yellow filter because I liked how it changed the shadows and helped bring out the details in the petals.

And that is that.  Next week is self-portraits - yikes.  I best be getting some beauty sleep and google some superb ideas so that I don't resemble the Mona Lisa or worse....Happy March Break to those of you on holidays next week!  Let's hope the weather forecasts are wrong and the sunshine continues!