Why black and white still matters
Some photos simply work better without colour. A portrait where the light falls beautifully across your granddaughter's face. A misty morning at the coast. A stone building with real texture and character. In all of these, colour can actually be a distraction — the eye gets pulled to a blue jacket or a red door rather than the person, the mood, or the shape.
Photoshop Elements has a dedicated tool called Convert to Black and White that gives you far more control than simply removing colour. The results look deliberate and considered — the kind of black and white you see in framed prints, not the washed-out grey you get from a quick fix.
Why not just remove the colour?
The quickest way to strip colour is Enhance → Adjust Color → Remove Color. This works, but it treats every colour in the photo equally. A red rose and a green leaf both become the exact same mid-grey, losing all contrast between them. The result often looks flat and lifeless.
The Convert to Black and White dialog is different. It lets you control how each colour — red, green, blue — translates into grey tones. Brighten the reds and anything red in the photo becomes lighter. Darken the greens and foliage goes darker, making skies and stone stand out. This is the same technique photographers used in the film era with coloured lens filters — now done in seconds with sliders.
How to use Convert to Black and White
Open your photo in Expert mode, then go to Enhance → Convert to Black and White.
The dialog opens with a large before/after preview and two main sections.
The style presets
On the left you will find six pre-built conversion styles, each optimised for a different type of photo:
- Portraits — softens skin tones and produces the classic flattering black and white portrait look
- Infrared Effect — turns foliage bright and skies dark; dramatic and striking for gardens, parks, and landscapes
- Newspaper — high contrast with crisp edges; works beautifully for architecture and buildings
- Scenic Landscape — a balanced conversion that holds detail in both sky and ground
- Vivid Landscapes — stronger contrast between sky and land for more dramatic results
- Urban/Snapshots — a neutral starting point for street scenes and general everyday photos
Click each style to see an instant preview on your photo. For most photos, one of these six will get you most of the way there in one click.
The fine-tuning sliders
After choosing a style, four sliders let you adjust the result:
- Red — lightens or darkens anything that was red: skin, lips, roses, brick walls
- Green — lightens or darkens grass, leaves, and foliage
- Blue — lightens or darkens skies, water, and blue clothing
- Contrast — increases or decreases the overall tonal range of the converted image
Drag each slider and watch the preview update in real time. Small adjustments make a noticeable difference — you rarely need to move them more than 20–30 points in either direction.
When you are happy, click OK.
Tips by photo type
Portraits — start with the Portraits preset. If the skin looks too pale or flat, drag the Red slider slightly right to warm and brighten the tones. Pull the Blue slider left slightly to deepen a neutral background. A small increase in Contrast gives the final print more presence.
Landscapes and gardens — try Infrared Effect first. Foliage goes bright and almost luminous; skies darken to a deep grey. If the effect feels too dramatic, pull the Green slider back a little to reduce the brightness of the leaves. This style is especially beautiful for photos of parks, country walks, and garden portraits.
Buildings and architecture — Newspaper or Urban/Snapshots. Increase the Contrast slider to bring out the texture of stonework or brick. These presets handle sharp edges and geometric shapes better than the others.
Old family photos you have scanned — the Portraits preset works well here too. It gives a natural, classic film-era feel that suits vintage subjects and family portraits from decades past.
One extra step worth doing
After converting, zoom in to the darkest areas of the photo — hair, shadows, dark clothing. Black and white conversion sometimes pushes these areas to pure black, losing detail that was there in the original. If this happens, go to Enhance → Adjust Lighting → Shadows/Highlights and raise the Shadows slider by 10–20 points to gently recover that detail. The Shadows and Highlights guide explains exactly how this tool works.
Keeping both versions
If you want to keep the original colour photo as well as the black and white version, use File → Save As to save the converted image as a new file. Give it a clear name — something like `portrait-bw.jpg` — so you can easily find both. Never overwrite your only copy of the colour original. The Save and Export guide covers the best formats for printing and sharing.