Aperture Tutorial: More Than Just Grayscale
By Jonathan Briggs
With advanced tools for adding colour tone to mono images, and controlling how an RGB image can be carefully worked into black and white, Aperture’s non-destructive editing environment really shows its worth. Non-destructive means just that — it’s a flexible way of working which is perfectly suited to the variations you want with monochrome. With Aperture, every move you make can be tweaked with just a click — today, tomorrow or next week.
Aperture also includes a set of colour filters in its monochrome mixer that offer real advantages to anyone producing black and white images from RGB originals. As ever, it’s a properly interactive interface that helps you attain the right balance between red, green and blue filters for any particular image. And if it doesn’t seem quite right, nothing’s lost and it’s ready for you to try your hand again. Jonathan Briggs illustrates how to go to black and white and beyond.
Step 1: When you have selected your image, click the + button at the top of the Adjustments Inspector or HUD, and select Monochrome Mixer (control M). This brings up an extra section showing a preset drop-down list, together with three separate channel sliders. Aperture provides a number of options as to how it simulates a coloured subject appearing on black and white film. This is done by offering a group of filters that are commonly used on the camera to increase contrast and density in certain areas of an image.
Step 2: In the drop-down list you’ll find a standard monochrome set-up, plus red, orange, yellow, green and blue filters. It’s important to understand how these filters will respond to colour subject matter, and we do that by making reference to the colour wheel. What this shows us is the complementary (or opposite) relationship of colour. From the wheel we can see that reds are opposite to cyans, magentas to greens, and blues to yellows. It’s these relationships that the filters utilise. Custom combinations can also be used to good effect.
Step 3: So how does this work in practice? A blue filter will emphasise and add contrast to the yellow areas of a colour image when it is converted to grayscale, whilst, for example, a green filter will emphasise the magentas and reds. Using this technique, extra drama and interest can be added to black and white images.
Step 4: If we now apply this notion to the image we’re using here, the interest is in her freckles. If they can be brought up just enough we can add depth and character to the picture. The standard monochrome preset leaves the face a little flat (on the left, above) because the colour information is made up of yellows and reds whilst the standard present tends towards a mix of a red and green filter which would emphasise blues and magentas. However, if we use a red filter (centre) the detail in the skin gets blown out since its complementary colour (cyan) is absent from the original image.
Step 5: The most effective filter for this image should be blue since it’ll give strong definition not just of the skin but also the hair and the overall shape and bone structure of the face. However, diving straight for the blue filter is in this case likely to push the image too far, which is why Aperture allows the user to create custom set ups by taking a preset filter and then adjusting the relevant sliders to fine tune the overall effect. In fact, when it comes to this image, by using the green filter preset and then dialing in some of the blue channel, we can subtly control the extent to which the freckle detail comes through.
Jonathan Briggs is a former MD of The Association of Photographers (AOP). Now a director of Magic Bean — a company set up to offer technical training and event logistics for companies working within the creative industry — Briggs has over ten years’ experience working with Macs and associated software across the design, imaging and photographic sectors. This series of guides offers a real-world user perspective on how you can get the most out of Aperture.
The images featured here are by Gino Sprio, a vastly experienced portrait/fashion commercial/fine art photographer who’s had everyone from Pelé to Morrissey to Sirs Anthony Hopkins and Ben Kingsley in front of his lens. Sprio’s clients range from Aston Martin to Barclaycard, and from The Sunday Times Magazine to US Vogue and Esquire.