Monochrome

In film photography, monochrome is typically the use of black-and-white film. Originally, all photography was done in monochrome.

Although colour photography was possible even in the late 19th century, however easily used color films, such as Kodachrome, were not available until the mid-1930s.

In digital photography, monochrome is the capture of only shades of black by the sensor, or by post-processing a color image to present only the perceived brightness by combining the values of multiple channels, usually red, green, and blue.

The weighting of individual channels may be selected to achieve a desired artistic effect; if only the red channel is selected by the weighting then the effect will be similar to that of using a red filter on panchromatic film.

If the red channel is eliminated and the green and blue combined then the effect will be similar to that of orthochomatic film or the use of a cyan filter on panchromatic film.

The selection of weighting thus allows a wide range of artistic expression in the final monochromatic image.