I took this back in February during our Venice Carnival Photo Tour, and I've been meaning to post it for ages. For one reason or another though I didn't get around to it, and I'm glad I didn't as it's a really fitting shot to post today.

A few months ago Libby and I were asked if we would like to create a course for Udemy, a fairly new company specialising in high quality online video training on a whole range of topics. Their aim is to recruit "the world's top experts, including New York Times best-selling authors, CEOs, celebrities, and Ivy League professors", so were pleased to be asked.

Anyway, one thing got in the way of another, but we committed to providing a new course by the end of last month: The Art of Black and White Photography. We finished a bit early - I think we had around 12 hours to spare - but only because I spent pretty much every waking minute of the last few weeks working on it.

There's over five and a half hours of video, split into 16 lectures that cover four broad topics: how to best convert your images to black and white, how to make selective and targeted adjustments to the tonal range and balance of an image, a specific chapter on black and white portraiture, and another on how to tone your black and white images: all of which, other than toning, were techniques I used to add to add more impact to this shot.

If you'd like find out more about this course, and grab yourself an early bird discount, just click the link below:

The Art of Black and White Photography

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I've also added this image as our latest Mini-PSD, so if you're subscribed to our tutorials you'll be able to download it and take a look at the various steps I worked through: a black and white conversion, involving two blended channel mixer adjustments, and six Curves adjustments to make global and selective changes to different sections of the image.