Do skiers prefer black and white images over color?

[CalG]

So much of the winter landscape is reduced to gray scale. And the "better the weather" all the more so.

Myself, I enjoy and appreciate images, prints and photographs in B&W over color "pictures".

Perhaps there is a common thread? Even a poem?

Or not.....

 

[pchewn]

I like color images, prints, and photographs over B&W "snapshots".....

 

[François Pugh]

It's all good. Although I prefer SKIING when I can see the bumps (flat light is getting worse on old eyes).

 

[slowrider]

I loose the need for speed in flat light. B&W photos.

 

[LiquidFeet]

As a rule, speaking of an artist in the know about what sells in art galleries and as an art teacher of many years, most viewers of art, art buyers, and art students prefer color over black-and-white. They just think it's "more" ... and thus better.

However, it isn't.

Black and white images are like poetry. Less is more.

 

[Lauren]

Depends on the photo...some look better in B&W, many look better in color.

 

[KevinF]

There was a Facebook "challenge" a few years ago of posting black and white photos. I will admit that I've never taken a B&W photo in my life, but I transitioned a couple color images to B&W via photoshop magic. Some images looked terrible in B&W and some were improved in B&W. It depends on what the focus of the image is.

One medium isn't inherently better than the other; each captures light differently and a skilled photographer can make either one work great.

I'm certainly not a skilled photographer, but the attached photos are the same thing. In B&W, my eyes are drawn to the texture of the rock. In color, my eyes are drawn to the girl. But maybe that's just me.

 

[SSSdave]

Indeed in many nearly monochrome snow scenes, black & white captures may be better, but generally it depends...

Have been a serious skier for decades and likewise a landscape photographer, however for art not income. Note, have never been into serious ski photography as that is time consuming and distracts from the fun of skiing. Experienced black & White photographers tend to be deeply into their art, especially traditional print making and most have been at it for many years. Thus on average are also much more skilled in understanding light and capturing aesthetic imagery.

Beyond snow photography, the primary issue is the average person lacks an understanding of the kind of lighting that can create a good image, so tends to judge what is good by their own eyesight that is a major mistake because our human eyes have a much greater dynamic range of luminance than a digital camera sensor, much less film. Thus usually if one exposes for white snow, everything else is too dark without detail or conversely if one exposes for non-snow elements, snow becomes bright and featureless. To take good photos among a list of other factors as Galen Rowell wrote, one must think like a camera sensor and its rectangular framing window. Potentially, if a scene has interesting color elements and good lighting, a color image is more likely to be better. For instance with skiers in colorful clothing in a shot with a beautiful blue sky.

Currently, most sunny ski days I do carry a tiny Canon ELPH 190 and take modest numbers of pictures. On days with clouds and flat light, the camera stays in my car because it is rather impossible to capture usable images. And on sunny days, I won't bother to take pictures except during narrow windows with good lighting. Such lighting is more likely to occur early or late in a day with a low sun angle that provides better snow texture but especially mid winter, one may find good subjects any time of day depending on slope orientation to the sun if one can see good snow surface texture. Later in winter into early spring on sunny days, usable light may be very limited as higher sun altitudes down on a snow surface are very harsh.

Even a relatively monochrome subject may be better in color given a beautiful blue sky:

 

[LiquidFeet]

Even a relatively monochrome subject may be better in color given a beautiful blue sky:

View attachment 94166

Stunning photos.
These are almost mono-chromatic.

 

[karlo]

altitudes down on a snow surface are very harsh.

Even a relatively monochrome subject may be better in color given a beautiful blue sky:

Can you post these as b&w, to compare?

 

[LiquidFeet]

Those two photos are brilliantly composed, and the lack of color contrasts in them highlights that strong composition. Converting them to black and white will reveal the amount of textural detail in each image. Right now our eyes are more focused on the subjects and how they look against their backgrounds.

By "lack of color contrasts," I mean the tan one doesn't have screaming-to-be-noticed blue or purple or green in it. And the blue one doesn't have any orange or red or yellow in it. Each image is nearly monochromatic. The first image's dominant color is tan and its nuclear family members. The second image's dominant color is blue. In both images, versions of its dominant color move up towards white and down towards black.

When I taught painting, one assignment I'd usually do was to have my students compose their painting of a still-life using a nearly-monochromatic color scheme, with one dominant color but embedding "nuclear family member colors" into the color scheme to add visual energy. They could choose any color they wanted to dominate their paintings. It was a good learning experience for them. They had to isolate the light-and-dark in the real world they were looking at from the colors there, and then make the volumes in their paintings look real using those lights and darks embedded in another color family.

 

[CalG]

I'm impressed by how this topic turned to technical photography over the intended "skier's prefer" theme.

But I have only ever composed three photographs in my life. Interestingly, they were all "full color", but only contained gray scale elements. The "colors" were lost in the lighting....

I must be scotopically motivated ')