Techniques
Converting Portraits to Black and White: A Retoucher's Guide
A great black and white portrait isn’t a color portrait with the saturation removed. It’s a fundamentally different interpretation of the image, and the conversion process gives you enormous creative control if you know how to use it. Here’s why “just desaturate” is the worst way to convert, and what to do instead. Why Desaturation Fails When you desaturate an image (Image > Adjustments > Desaturate), Photoshop converts each pixel to a gray value based on a fixed luminosity formula.