Black & white photography has always been a passion of mine. In pre-digital days I always processed and printed my own black & white film, spending hours in a darkroom under a dim red safelight up to my elbows in trays of developer and fixer. With digital cameras the whole process is so much cleaner (and probably safer!)
All my weddings include a proportion of black and white images. The exact ratio of colour to black and white images varies from wedding to wedding but is always around the 75:25 mark, as that seems to fit with what most couples want. The proportion of black and white images in your wedding gallery is entirely up to you and can be specified when you make your booking, or at any point up to your wedding.
Occasionally, I get asked to photograph a wedding or subsequently design an album entirely in black & white. This is an option I am delighted to offer to couples at no extra charge, as I believe that black and white images have the power to evoke emotion in a way that colour rarely does. Black and white photographs fit perfectly with my approach as a documentary wedding photographer.
All the images I take at a wedding using professional Nikon DSLRs are captured in full colour. This has the advantage of allowing either colour or black and white images (or even both) to be provided from the post-processing phase. It also ensures that the maximum quality can be obtained from each image file.
The albums used to present your black and white images should be elegant with a clean, uncluttered design; storybook or matted albums, both offer a contemporary and tasteful presentation that will always be in fashion.
