Try The Ultimate Creative Photos Filter - Black and White

Revisiting the elegance of Black and White

When Instagram first launched, shooting with retro filters was all the rage. A few of them were nice but many were almost painful to view. They added scratches and dust, over-exaggerated colors - often were a lame attempt to get attention for an otherwise unremarkable photo. 

But the retro grand dame filter of them all, a look that never gets old, is the original - black and white. 

Black and white (or monotone, greyscale, b&w, whatever you call it) photography has been the signature look for the work of so many famous photographers. Think Ansel Adams or Henri Cartier-Bresson. If you’re a baby boomer you first saw the world through the lenses of photo journalists who shot black and white film because they could process it in a field tent and get prints into the evening edition. And it made everything look great. Dramatic. Timeless. Without the distractions of color.

As luck would have it, the iPhone lets you hop into the Way Back Machine and shoot in black and white too. Not take a normal color photo and then apply the black and white filter, but shoot in black and white from the get go. Shooting in black and white is a great exercise that will make you a better photographer because it relies exclusively on composition and light.

To try it, here’s what you do: 

1) To have the black and white filter on by default, you have to check the Creative Controls preference in Settings > Camera > Preserve Settings and make sure it’s switched ON. 

2) In the Camera App, tap the up arrow at the top of the window so that the Filters icon shows in the row right above the shutter button.

Then . . .

3) Tap the Filters icon and choose the black and white version you like: Monotone for normal contrast; Silvertone for a slightly warm tone; Noir for a contrasty look. 

Now your Camera will remember your filter choice when you open it next time to take a picture and you can see how the changes you make in composition really affect how well a shot works. And, by the way, you can always remove that filter in editing and get the image in original color if you want.