B&W mode

[ashdown]

I'd really like to do more black and white work but I find it hard to visualise when seeing the world in colour. If there were a mode to turn the display/viewfinder b&w I would love it. I'm happy for the RAW files to come out in colour as this would give me the greatest freedom in post to make the picture I want. Its possible in almost every camera with jpeg picture styles but I can't find a way to do it on my X1D.

[JCM-Photos]

I agree, it would really be fine having a B&W viewfinder

[SeanRL]

Another vote for a B&W mode with the ability to select yellow, red, blue etc. filter in camera as desired.

S

[Georg Kovalcik]

And a vote against. Obviusly none of the iconic b&w photographs of the past were done with a finder that you could switch to monochrome. I´m glad that Hasselblad does not overload the menu with such features.

[Dicky]

Pehaps if you can only 'see' and 'perceive' in 'colour' ...

Theres always the 'old-school option' of "back-to-basics"
by perhaps switching to a vinatge SLR cameras (even, just for a day)
and by using B+W film and only one lens, perhaps, just even a standard-lens!

Youve only then got so many shots ... so effectively, inflicting a creative-constraint on ones self, but for creative-reason!!
So you'll have to be very selective indeed, really consider each composition carefully in order to create something groovy in B+W on that roll of film!

May help you to broaden and develop your sense of perception with regard to 'seeing' in B+W.
Oddly, the experience of doing this exercise remains, as I have also done this from time-to-time over the years too!!
Usually after shooting "too much of the same" studio still-life subject matter in "full-frightening-colour"

Best wishes

[JCM-Photos]

in good old film days even the B&W master himself "Ansel Adams" recommended using a brown Wratten 90 filter as a viewing device to previsualize the scene rendering in B&W during the shooting !

[Dicky]

Hi JCM

Adams stunning large-format film image results and large fibre-based prints always, impress with absolute awe!!
He was exceptionally talented, was the inventor of the "Zone System" after all ...

As, master landscape photographers and master printers go, he was an absolute Guru, for he inspired so many others too!
Wonder if he had a really-cool, custom-made focusing cloth!?

Best wishes

[JCM-Photos]

Talking about Adams most people think large format photography. This was true for a long time of his career.
But one has not to forget that his 25 last years he worked almost exclusively with a Hasselblad 500  on
Tri-X film exposed for 200 ISO développée in highly diluted HC110 (for more details see his book "The Negative")

[Dicky]

So lucky JCM to have studied the works of Adams, when at art school, many decades ago 
His large format work, always impresses me most of all. Mind blowing image quality.

Recall, it was Adams that recommended ...
The peroidic (every 6 months) "cycling" of V system lenses on bodies, firing and working ones way through all the speeds + apertures (and even in betweens/intermediates) to keep all working smoothly and perfectly,
when kit is in storage, most evidently, some really superb advice!!

Always 'deved' Kodak Tri-X 35mm, 120 and 5x4 film stock in Agfa Rodinal ...
Then printed "old-school" on a Devere enlarger fitted with a Cold-Cathode lamp/light source. Absolutely adore the results from both Agfa Record Rapid and Agfa Portriga Rapid fibre-based printing papers!

One of my old photo buddies, whos an award winning Superstar Documentary Photographer, with 88 pieces of his work in the Tate Collection ...
Still, even, in this day and age, makes a living out of printing and selling his B+W prints on fibre based paper!

V system is very hard to put down once you've developed (pardon the punn) "a connection" with it, well, thats my excuse!!

Best wishes

[mmanesh]

Definitely another vote from me - to introduce a monochrome view for the X2D.

[Tennisarm12]

Fully agree - BW mode for the display is a must. Hasselblad please act.