I usually know when I am going to make a shot black and white, but I always make the change in post. I tend not to carry filters with me beyond ND, CP, and graduated ND. There's just one simple rule for whether to use black and white or color. "Does the color add anything"? Though I guess that's the simple rule for everything. Just eliminate everything that doesn't add to the shot. Probably 90% of my shots end up in color.

PatMann said:
Are the color filters in PhotoShop as effective in creating BW from color as the color filters were? I haven't experimented - have you?

I use and like the channel mixer. Soap's right. It's cheating, but I'm sure J.C. Maxwell (the scientist who took the first color photo) would see the wisdom.

Even better is the b/w conversion of adobe camera raw or lightroom; I've never used silver efex.

PatMann, shooting digital color and adjusting the RGB manually before desaturation works (I hate to say) better than filters. It's like always picking exactly the right filter(s) for every shot.

Therefore it is cheating. ;) and real men shoot film and live with the consequences of their poor decisions in the field. ;)

PatMann - if You want to convert to B&W and You are very serious about it, than there's only one great solution on the market - NikSoft Silver FX Pro

A B&W sensor would be great - 4 times the resolution with no Bayer filter, but then you'd HAVE to use color filters at the lens, no color to recover in PP. A changeable sensor module would be a nice feature. High-res, high-sensitivity, B&W, infrared, all in the same camera.

I always used to carry yellow, red, green and orange (in the days when all the Nikon primes used 52mm or 72mm filters). Skies - yellow for natural, red for dramatic. Skin tones and darken lips - green. Foliage - green to brighten. Stone and wood - orange to bring out details of texture. Now the filter sizes are all over the map, except for the pro zooms standard 77mm size.

Are the color filters in PhotoShop as effective in creating BW from color as the color filters were? I haven't experimented - have you?

Perhaps the camera of the future will be like the cameras of the past - put the sensor in your camera for your current purpose - high MPs high bit depth - b&w - high ISO... Just like you used to choose your film. Different sensors, optimized for different situations, they have this now (different MPs) in medium format. Would also extend the useful lives of our camera bodies, they could be more easily upgraded.

Almost always in Post: like this picture sure would look great in B&W

Pete

Maybe someday we could get a B&W camera, just like we can modify to do IR

I don't really worry about filters so much. You just need to think in terms of value. If you are shooting an interior you don't want the persons t-shirt being the same value as the wall or whatever is behind them.

I also shot color, as anyway it doesn't matter if You shot RAW, but sometimes I know that the picture I'm taking will be turned into B&W

I always shoot in color and use only one filter: Polarizing. I do the B&W later in post production. It saves buying and carrying all these filters ! And the result is better too :o)

I do enjoy B&W.
What i decided it based upon is the colors in the scene im studying, if they would look good in B&W and really make the B&W come alive.
Ive often done so in post production as well, looking at an image and judging by it colors, i might go hey, even tho this wasent the intention, it might look pretty good in B&W, lets try it, just because i can!.

When you're out shooting do you pre-visualize what you want for B&W or do you make the decision in post production?

When shooting film it was, of course, already preordained. When shooting B&W for landscapes I also tended to filter a lot (red or orange for deepened sky). If you are pre-visualizing your shots in B&W, do you use filters?

Also - how many do produce B&W images?