Crash Course

[Tpformanphotography (Ted P. Forman)]

I can spend all day watching and listening to the sound of large waves pounding into offshore rocks. That is exactly what I was doing recently along the Oregon coast. I set up my camera and tripod on the beach and watched as the waves moved in and met up with these large sea stacks. I would trip the shutter and capture a sequence of images whenever this resulted in some good action. After reviewing the photos on my laptop I selected the best ones , and decided to convert this particular image to black and white and process it in Lightroom.

Specific Feedback Requested

Besides the usual general feedback from the community, I would like to get some advice on where I might be able to improve on the black and white processing. I have been doing more of these conversions lately and liking it vey much, so any constructive criticism would be most appreciated.

Technical Details

Canon R7, 1/2500 sec at f/6.3, ISO 400
Original raw file converted and processed in black and white in Lightroom Classic

[AndreDonawa]

Great image Ted.
I like the composition with the 3 black rocks and the 2 white waves layered on top of each other. Nice pattern. And then you have the sky and the foreground adding to the mix.
One of the things that I found helps me a lot with B&W images is to pay special attention to large elements in the scene and decide how you would like to portray them.
I find we are more open to radical creative changes in B&W’s than we are in colour. Just check out Ansel Adams sky in Monlith.
Here’s a rough edit in LR with a gradient filter and range mask. I also cropped a bit of the left side to stop the change in angle of the rock.
I think my edit helps to bring out the B&W pattern even more.
I don’t think my edit is the right way to do it. It’s just a different way to tell the story. Like the detail you caught with that speedy SS.

[Tpformanphotography (Ted P. Forman)]

Thanks for your feedback. I do think the changes you made helped the image stand out more.