During a trip to Costa Rica last year, I would often wake up before the sun rose to hike to a spot to take some predawn pictures. I would stay in the location until the sun had risen and then usually pack it up. But I found myself drawn to this majestic rock on a point near Playa Conchal. Hiking to this rock could only be done safely during low tide. After the sun had risen, this jagged rock jutting out from the ocean looked absolutely majestic against the back drop of a clear blue sky.

But this was not without problems. The harsh sunlight also created an extreme dynamic range, especially one wracked with underexposed lows. True, I could have bracketed the exposures, but I thought these would be the perfect fit for converting to black and white.

Black and white photography is a dying art form. With modern cameras and HDR allowing for a wide dynamic range, most photographers prefer to show the brilliance of colour as opposed to the tonal range of black and white. Good black and white photographers see things in black and white; they see in a scene the way it would appear with a black and white palette. I am not cut of the same cloth, I’ll be the first to admit, as I see colour first and black and white is more of an after thought.

In this situation, however, I recognized the pictures being taken, because they were so contrasty in the mid day sun, were perfectly suited for black and white photography. To process some of these pictures to Black and White, I used the basic black and white conversion in Lightroom as a starting point and tweaked until I felt satisfied with the resulting image. For others, I used Nik SilverFX.

Here’s an example of the jagged rock in colour and the same shot in black and white.

Costa Rica Point: Colour to Black and White
Nikon D800 w/ 16-35 f/4 @ 26mm, ISO 100, 20 sec at f/16
Both versions were edited in Lightroom

The colour version really highlights the varying colour tones in the rock and despite the blue of the water, the warm colours of the rock leave a warm feeling, while the black and white version has a completely different feel to it, at times cold, silent and ominous.

Here is a collection of some of the other pictures I took at the same spot during the week, with the majestic jagged rock prominently featured.

Rocks in Black and White
Nikon D800 w/ 16-35 f/4 @ 16mm, ISO 100, 1/6 sec at f/16
Processed in Nik SliverFX and tweaked in Lightroom.

Rocks in Black and White LE
Nikon D800 w/ 16-35 f/4 @ 16mm, ISO 100, 180 sec at f/16
Taken with the same composition as the previous picture, but with the Lee Filters Big Stopper for a long exposure. Processed in Nik SliverFX and tweaked in Lightroom.

Rocks and Water Black and White
Nikon D800 w/ 16-35 f/4 @ 30mm, ISO 100, 75 sec at f/16
Processed in Nik SliverFX and tweaked in Lightroom.

The Rock on the Point in Playa Conchal
Nikon D800 w/ 16-35 f/4 @ 26mm, ISO 100, 20 sec at f/16
Processed in Lightroom.

Close-up of the Rock on the Point in Playa Conchal
Nikon D800 w/ 16-35 f/4 @ 26mm, ISO 100, 20 sec at f/16
Same picture as the previous one, but cropped to feature the jagged rock more prominently.Processed in Nik SliverFX and tweaked in Lightroom.

Emergence
Nikon D800 w/ 16-35 f/4 @ 16mm, ISO 200, 12 min at f/16
By far my favourite shot from this series. An extreme long exposure created using the Big Stopper by Lee Filters. Processed in Nik SliverFX and tweaked in Lightroom.

Out of this World
Nikon D800 w/ 16-35 f/4 @ 22mm, ISO 100, 180 sec at f/16
Processed in Lightroom.

So as you can see, the harsh sunlight might not have been the best for colour pictures, but it was perfectly suited for black and white.