Working with Photographs Since printing copy must be either black or white, a photograph as it appears, cannot be reproduced. The camera would see only the blacks and the whites, making the grays disappear. This creates the illusion of gray tones. A black and white photo is better than a color photo for reproduction. Black and white film is designed to convert colors to different values of black, white and gray.
Color film is used specifically for copying the exact color as it is seen.
With a black and white photo, the colors have already been converted to black, white and gray using the correct film type. A good example of this theory is a color photo of a person. Since the process camera sees red as black, and skin tones consist mostly of red shades, they may be seen as dark gray or black. This makes the photo reproduce very dark, showing little detail. For best results, choose black and white photographs with good contrast for your project.