January Photo Challenge – Go Black and White
Friday, January 8, 2010 
32 Comments
Nicole at NicoleB Photography has presented January Photo challenge – Go black and white. Thanks Nicole for doing the challenge. The rules are simple:
“My challenge to my fellow Photogeeks out there is to gather information about b&w photography and share what you found with the Rest of us. Including your new photos.”
Well what I gathered came from Quilly at Quintessentially Quilly:
She said: (The title of the email was Learn)
Thom,
Picasa has free picture editing software. It is super easy to use. You can change and crop your photos and do all kinds of neat things. Check it out.
If you can read and click your mouse, you can do this! Just remember when you change a photo and go to save it, to click, “save as” so you always have your original.
He said: And why would I want to do it to any photo?
She said: You just said you wanted to join the black & white challenge!
He said: Oh I get it LOL. A little slow on the draw if you ask me LOL Thank goodness we have the entire month of January LOL 
Thanks for sending this.
So what I learned is about Picasa. I thought this could only be done with the camera. I didn’t know that programs can change a photo from color to black and white.
Then, a little bit after that a great blog that I follow, John at The Aware Writer had two tutorials on black and white photography. Digital Photography: Converting Color Images to B&W I and Digital Photography: Converting Color Images to B&W II. If any of you don’t follow John’s blog it’s wonderful. He puts up with all my questions and does wonderful photography. What I learned from him was that people still use film. Can you believe that? I had no clue! I kept thinking everything was digital now days.
I’ve got a lot to learn but I want to thank both Quilly and John for teaching me something new. I’ve still got a very very very long way to go and understanding photography is something I never knew I would like or even attempt to do. But this is a start. So I am going to show you one photo, first in color and then what I did in black and white. It’s nothing spectacular, but I got it done. WOOT!!!
Hey, it’s only my opinion.
A Hui Hou
You didn’t know Picasa ? I found it I don’t know how once when I started blogging and photographing. It’s just a wonderful thing. You HAVE to download it. All pictures when they are too dark or too light or if there is something in which doesn’t fit, I chase through Picasa and it does everything for me.
It’s fun to learn ! Highly recommended !
Well I didn’t know it could change colors. I have downloaded it and will give it a whirl once in a while
Well you learn something new every day – well done you!
Isn’t that the truth. Glad you enjoyed
Heck Thom, you have a program on your computer already if you have any kind of WINDOWS…go to programs/paint
There you can change a colored photo to black and white and save it.
Thanks for the tip. I didn’t know that either. I don’t use many photo programs as you can tell
Good job on the photo!
I always use Picasa. It’s super easy.
Glad to know that
Thanks for sharing 
Great transformation from colors to B/W. She’s one heck of a lovely lady!
I learn new things everyday by just blog hopping!
Isn’t that the truth and that’s a great thing to learn by going to different blogs. Thanks for the comment about my niece
That’s a gorgeous shot, Thom!
Lovely work
You can check out GIMP as well, if you had fun.
The link is on my blog.
It’s another beautiful free software
Mahalo my friend. I was going to download it from John’s site but forgot so when I saw it on yours I downloaded it. Glad you enjoyed this
Good job! You’re so funny.
Thank you…your just now realizing that? pffft where have you been? LOL
Right here…
with the usual case of CRS Syndrome, obviously.
Keep reminding me!
ROFLMAO!!! Oh you and I are so alike LOL
Funny conversation.
I use Picasa, too, but I haven’t really experimented with the different effects.
Me either…It amazes me what you can do
Good job, Thom. Isn’t learning about photography and different sites fun? Picnik.com is also a fun site for simple or complicated editing. Beware though, you can spend hours fooling around on there. :v)
Thanks for sharing the information my friend. Much appreciated. It most certainly is fun. I really like it
never used picasa. i’ll have to give it a whirl! thanks!
I hadn’t either LOL. The things we learn
hey, i told you about picasa not too long ago.
it’s really super easy to use
nice try!
Crap my friend. I forgot all about that. I do apologize and do give you Kudos for telling me about it.
Wowowee! It looks wonderful, Thom. Ssshhh.. I didn’t know about programs changing color photos to b&w either … lol. Miss Unawares
I’ve seen Picasa everywhere but I didn’t tinker well enough. I wish I had the time. Thanks for sharing this. I’ll try it one of these days.
You know what, you hit the nail on the head. It’s getting the time to tinker with it Ms. Unawares…Have a great weekend
Good information, there are lots of programs out there that will let you make the change. One of my digital camera will actually let me take photos in B&W. The photo in my post today was shot in B&W mode. What you see is straight from the camera.
Well I’m going to have to break out my manual I can tell that now. Glad you liked the information
Have a good weekend my friend. 
Thom — I distinctly remember you telling me you didn’t care and weren’t going to try it. In fact, you left a comment on my blog saying that you had no interest in doing anything with your photographs but downloading them from your camera.
See, now you’ve tried it. It’s easier than you thought, and you’re actually pretty good at it.
Well thank you Q. And yes I do remember telling you that. There is so much to learn from all of this I can’t see straight most of the time and most of these pictures I get are pure luck. But I’ll take ‘em
Ooh yay, thanks for posting this! Your picture looks really cool…I had no idea Picasa could turn pictures from color to black and white. I was also wondering how to crop without ruining the original..and I now know that too!
WOOT…isn’t it amazing what you can learn from blogs? One of the best things about them.