Any B&W Photographers?

[itself]

I am purchasing a Nikon 5100 and am also looking at the Canon and Epsom printers in the thousand dollar range. My understanding is that you take the picture in color and then photo shop it to black and white. Of course, I could buy the Leica Monochrome camera for $9k, but that's a bit out there!

The Canon Pixma Pro and the Epsom 3880 get great reviews for printing B&W. Anyone have any input?

Thanks!

[BikeDutchess]

I have the Nikon 5100 also. You can take the B&W directly with the camera if you prefer, it also has several "filters" (settings in the camera) you can use depending on the B&W effect you want to achieve.

[chatnoire]

Your best bet is to take the photo in color, and use photoshop, lightroom, or another image editing program to apply the appropriate filters, adjust the contrast, etc.

This link goes into a basic explanation of filter effects.

Epson is a great company for printers, and I've always had great success with their image results. Make sure you use true Epson inks, and high quality paper. Varying the paper will give you different results, as well, as some will dry down more, lowering your contrast and dynamic range of the photo.

I would also recommend that you get a screen calibration tool, and using that, calibrate your screen to the printer output (your printer will include a color profile) so that what you see on the screen is what you will get with the printer.

I personally love Lightroom as editing software for the intermediary step between camera and print. I don't know much about the 5100, but on all my digital work, I shoot RAW, and edit from there. There is more information to work with in a raw file which will allow you better quality output.

Let me know if there's any specific questions you have. I was a pro photographer for several years, and had a huge workflow setup for various output methods and purposes, and would be happy to help with anything in getting you set up.

[itself]

Thanks so much!!!