Scott Shephard Photography

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06-06-15 More Than 50 Shades of Gray

By Scott Shephard

In this photo I've moved downstream about 25 yards from the photo posted two days ago. Frankly, I like this photo and location better.

And just for the fun of it, I've turned Iron Creek black and white, though a black and white photo is really a photo that has thousands of shades of black and white, with little pure white and little pure black.

I have suggested before that there are two reasons I like black and white photographs. The first plays to nostalgia: in the early days of photography, there was no such thing as a color photograph. And in my early days as a photographer, all of my photos were black and white. I figure if black and white was good enough for Ansel Adams and Edward Weston, it's good enough for me.

The second reason is that black and white photos cause the viewer to see a scene differently.  In this photo I won't tell you what you should be seeing. Instead watch the short video and see the difference between two versions of the same scene. I suspect that more of you will like the color version better: there are nice colors and it is more "real," after all. But I'll stick with the black and white version.