self-portraits & the magic of black and white photography

yesterday, me and my friend theresa went to one of my favorite spots in nature and photographed each other. we’ve done this a few times before and besides the occasional self-portrait, the photos from these sessions are usually the only professional photos i have of myself. today, while going through the photos again, i yet again feel in awe of having photographs of myself that look - intentional and sacred. as i was editing, i thought about how important i think it is for people to have intentional photographs of them taken, at any point in their life, alone, at their favorite spots, with nature, their animals and their family and friends. of course, as a photographer myself i am biased, but i do truly believe this to be unbelievably beautiful and important. this is something i want to focus on more in the future, actually taking the time to set up a time and place for me to take intentional photographs of myself, with friends, family, my pet or at my favorite spot. i want to revisit the magic of photo albums again soon, as i feel it’s important to not just keep everything digitally stored.

i also found myself, naturally gravitating towards editing dozens of photos to be black and white. this is something i almost always intuitively want to do when i come home and sit down to edit. in the past, and maybe still, i’ve held myself back from doing so, as i’ve learned in my years as a photographer, that black and white photos aren’t always widely appreciated when working with people. of course this is not the case for every person i work with, some may love them to be that way, but i’ve also noticed people specifically pushing for colored ones, which made sense.

i just now spent a bit of time pondering on why i feel so intuitvely drawn to black and white photos, not just my own, but any black and white photos. i thought back to a few phrases i had heard over the years, especially ones saying that black and white photography was the ‘‘easy’’ route of editing a photo. of course this can make sense, there aren’t that many choices when it comes to black and white photography, sure there are different variations, but never in a million years as many as there are colored ones.

so am i just lazy? do i just want to take the easy way and edit photos to be black and white because it’s more convenient and takes less time? i don’t think so, otherwise i wouldn’t be so mesmerized by every photo i edit that way. whenever i allow myself to edit a photo into a black and white one, the picture immediately captivates something inside of me. it’s almost like i can’t look away. it’s satisfying, it’s beautiful.

i think black and white photography feels so special to me, because it is all about the emotions, the movement, the expression and what is in the photo. often colors can be distracting and of course there are so many different ways to edit a photo, some people may solely focus on the way the color is edited in a photograph. don’t get me wrong, i love color photography, i love colors! my entire life and my entire universe within is extraordinarily colorful. but i think there is so much magic to monochrome colors. for me, it makes the picture feel more alive, which now as i am writing this, i know many will say quite the opposite, which makes sense too.

there is so much beauty in both, i’m glad we have the choice. shooting a black and white photo, for me, takes away the colors, but leaves the simplicity of raw emotion and maybe even focus. i could look at a monochrom photo for ages, it almost feels like it is more vulnerable. there is no color to hide behind.

now while writing this, i just fell in love with everything about it all over again.