In-camera black and white image processing ~ Sony A7

After tone mapping Creative Style Black and White where Contrast [0..-3] a Sony A7RII, I applied a setting to a Sony A7 and went to an exhibition of automobiles.  The event was the avant depart of the Tour Auto 2026.

My setup was the aforementioned Sony A7 plus one of my garbage/trash/crap lenses - Ricoh Riconar 55mm f/2.2 in Pentax K mount.  

I wanted to see if the wide open magik the lens comes with could translate well to cars.  I already knew it would be outstanding at f/8 and f/11.  To confirm the tone map findings I shot RAW + jpg with the following in-camera settings  -

• Creative Style Black and White
• Contrast -1
• DRO 

This recipe matches the in-camera black and white default jpg processing of a Fuji GFX100RF.  I like that "look."

The event was interesting and I had a wonderful time.

Once back home and without reviewing the in-camera output I moved all the jpgs into a separate folder and processed the RAW.  There were a few images I liked in BW and processed those RAWs using my Digital Zone System 0EV as Zone 5 recipe.

On a lark I compared a RAW processed black and white against the in-camera jpg.  Here is what I found -

 

Sony A7 - shutter speed 1/200th sec
Ricoh 55mm f/2.2 at f/2.2 - highlight glow galore

Matrix metering - no Digital Zone System 
spot metering required 

 

To me, all the thinking, wondering, measuring and futzing about is well worth the effort.  Understanding and knowledge is unbeatable.

Onward.